Physiological Differences
by CannibaLilly
Summary: A collection of one-shots about the differences in human and Time Lord physiology. Part 1 discusses the superiority, part 2 the inferiority. Both parts are separated into different stories
1. Part 1a

**Part 1.a: Two of everything**

Ever since Donna Noble started travelling with the Doctor she inwardly waited for a prove of his alienness. Of course there was the TARDIS – nothing could be more alien than this ship – but in the end it was just a prove for the old girl's alienness.

Donna kept waiting for such a prove from the Doctor himself, not consciously, but continuously. None appeared and slowly she came to terms with seeing the Doctor as a very smart, very weird human who had somehow grabbed hold of all those alien tools. She wasn't very disappointed about it, maybe she was even relieved. If he had turned out to be the Martian as which she kept addressing him just for the fun of it, it might had crept her out.

And then all that changed. It was a day when they had been running and the Doctor had been talking, a day like every other, that introduced Donna to how alien her Martian really was.

The high-pitched noise of laser guns being fired bounced off the walls around the Doctor and Donna. They were running through the narrow corridors of some kind of mouldy dungeon in a galaxy far away from home.

"Run!" the Doctor shouted unnecessarily over his shoulder. Donna did her best to keep up with him.

"I am!" she replied angrily and completely out of breath and then: "We need a better plan than that."

"Run _faster_!" he proposed. Just when he'd said that he suddenly stopped, his sneakers were sliding over the slick ground and he had some trouble with keeping his balance, but finally he stood completely still and looked to the right side.

Donna reached him seconds later and all but crashed into him. The Doctor caught her and pushed her into a very tiny niche Donna wouldn't have recognized if not for the Doctor. He followed her close behind and pressed Donna against the greasy wall.

She pulled a face, disgusted by the feeling against her clothes and skin.

"Sorry. Shush!" He whispered firmly before the sound of footsteps arose. The Doctor pressed himself even closer against Donna and hence pressed Donna closer against the wall. She twitched her mouth nauseated, but kept quiet.

The group of guards dashed past them and Donna held her breath. Moments later, that felt like ages, the group was gone and the sound of their feet faded away. Their luck that the Doctor had been right. Those aliens had been living in the dungeons for centuries and were all but blind; additionally the smell around here drowned every other hint of their existence.

Donna waited a solid minute after the noises had vanished before she asked: "Are they gone?"

The Doctor waited another second before he replied whispering: "S'pose so, yes."

They exchanged a relieved smile and when the Doctor didn't made any further attempts to move Donna frowned.

"Err, Spaceman..."

"Yeah?"

"Would you shift your arse?" The slick mould felt moist against her skin and she was sure it had started to seep through her top. Donna pressed her hands against the Doctor's chest to make him move and pulled back like she'd burned her hands.

The Doctor awkwardly took a step back before he recognized the shocked expression on his companion's face.

"What's wrong?" he wanted to know.

"Your-" Donna started, not sure how to say it and just pointed at his chest and then looked down at her palms. "_Two_," she managed to say before turned her hands for the Doctor to see.

A frown appeared on his forehead and he looked down at himself.

"What?" he asked, puzzled.

"Two!" Donna repeated, her tone nearly accusing as if he had done this on purpose. "There were two... _things_ beating in your chest!"

"Those two are called hearts, thank you very much," he replied slightly offended.

"Heart**s**," Donna said, emphasizing the 's'. "How come you've got two of them?!"

"I didn't steal one, if that's what you're afraid of," the Doctor mocked. Then he realised that Donna wasn't in the mood for jokes and simply shrugged. "I've been born with two – All Time Lords are," he told her matter-of-factly.

"Why?" Donna asked with a squeaky voice.

"What do you mean 'why'? It's quite useful, so why not?"

Donna didn't say anything to that. She looked at her palms for a moment and then wrapped her arms around herself. The distant sound of more footsteps reminded them of where they were and the Doctor and Donna crept back to the TARDIS without having to hide again.

The blue box was safely trundling through the vortex, far away from any slick dungeons and the Doctor and Donna were sitting in the kitchen over two cups of steaming tea.

"Do you want to talk about the... hearts-thing-y?" the Doctor carefully asked. He hadn't expected that this awareness would startle Donna like that.

Donna shook her head, hesitated and nodded then. Finally she shrugged.

"You could have told me before," she complained.

"Sorry, I'm quite used to them, so I tend to forget arranging caution labels." Gladly the Doctor accepted Donna swatting at his arm, it meant she could deal with his jokes again.

"And you've always had two?" Donna asked.

"Yup," he popped the 'p'.

"Blimey! Doesn't that drive you insane? I mean... are they even beating at the same time?"

The Time Lord chuckled at Donna's newly discovered curiosity for his anatomy. He usually was the explorer more than the explored subject, but this conversation was more enjoyable than he'd expected.

Deciding that learning was still best done by doing, the Doctor stood up and walked around the table, offering Donna his chest to find out herself.

She frowned suspiciously at him at first, but then she really wanted to know and raised her hands to his chest. Carefully she rested her palms against the Doctor's shirt. She felt the soft throbbing against her hands. Not quite at the same time but in an oddly harmonious way, they beat in time.

"Blimey," she repeated and when she recognized she was still touching him, she pulled her hands away.

The Doctor gave her his enthusiastic smile he always wore when he could teach her something new so Donna decided this was the best time to ask.

"What about pulse? Would a doctor - a real doctor, mind you - know you've two hearts when he feels your pulse?"

"I am a real doctor!" he retorted offended. "And it doesn't need a medic, _like me_, to feel it."

Petulantly he offered her his wrist to try. Donna grinned and reached out, taking his pulse with her index and middle finger like she'd seen in crime movies.

And really, she could feel two pulses.

"What if you lose one?" she suddenly wanted to know. "Does it kill you? Do you need both?"

"I need both," the Doctor replied calmly. "But it doesn't directly kill me to lose one. It weakens me, though and it's not a pleasant feeling."

After all this new information, Donna sat back in her seat and the two friends to a long sip from their tea.

"Do you feel better about them now?" the Doctor finally wanted to know. He still saw the shocked look in Donna's eyes when he thought about the dungeons.

"Of course, dumbo! I'm not that easily scared. It just came as a surprise," she replied. She didn't want to admit that it had shaken her image of the very human-like Doctor and she had been scared, no matter what she said. Now that she knew more about it, she could accept it.

All this must have been written on her face because the Doctor suddenly decided he could go a little further. Confidently he pointed out: "I don't get why everyone's so interested in the hearts all the time."

"Do you mean that's not everything you've got two of?" Donna wondered.

The Doctor waggled his eyebrows suggestively at her and Donna felt a flush creeping onto her face. No! He could impossibly mean he had two... Oh, she didn't even want to think about that possibility!... Would that imply Time Ladies also had two...

"Oh, you Space-pervert!" she exclaimed and hit his arm. "I could have lived without _that_ information!" She hit him again and an expression of confusion and agony appeared on his face.

"What's wrong with having two livers?!" he wanted to know and tried to escape another of Donna's blows. The ginger hesitated and gaped at him, unbelieving.

"Livers? If you were talking about those, what was that smug look for?"

"Having two livers is pretty great," he justified and the look reappeared on his face, telling Donna he really had been talking about them.

"W-what did you thought I meant?" he asked, sounding rather sheepish.

"Never mind it," Donna replied shortly.

"But, you-"

"Never. Mind. It. Doctor."

They exchanged an embarrassed look and both had to stifle a grin. Donna took a deep breath then and announced: "I'm just glad that we could sort all that out. No nasty surprises anymore."

"You think that's everything?" the Doctor asked amused. "Time Lords may look like humans but there are countless differences. Organs are just the tip of the iceberg."

Donna gave him an intimidated look.

"What else is there, Martian?"

He put an even smugger look on.

"You'll find out, Miss Noble. Sooner or later."


	2. Part 1b

**Part 1.b: Breathless**

Meeting Jack Harkness was always fun but at the same time straining. Fun because Jack always had one or two funny (and saucy) stories to tell that made Donna giggle and the Doctor blush. Also the Captain knew how to flirt with Donna in a way that wasn't intrusive but flattering – the ginger had a wonderful time with him.

The straining part came later, when Jack left them again. For a reason that was beyond Donna, but probably was concerned with the male ego, the Doctor couldn't hold his tongue for a single second. Donna was used to him being talkative, but after meeting Jack he just went over the top with it.

After he'd finished telling her about why Jack wasn't that brave and funny and what-not (always underlining that they were good friends) he started talking about situations he' been in himself that Jack would never have been able to solve.

Today's story was about the Doctor's fight against a giant squid in a deep lake on an ancient world that was long gone. Donna listened to his monologue, nodding and mumbling agreement at times until she was fed up with it.

"It took me 5 minutes to figure out that it was no octopus but a novempus, which basically means this creature had 9 arms instead of 8 and-"

"Oh, now you're showing off!" Donna interrupted him annoyed. "The 10 minute search, then the fight that took you ages and now 5 minutes you wasted with thinking. _Underwater_! How daft do you think I am? You're not the flippin' Fish Lord, when did you breath?"

"I'm not showing off!" the Doctor replied hurt. "I can hold my breath just longer than humans can!"

Donna snorted dismissively. "The next thing you'll be telling me is that you've got gills!"

"Don't need any! Three words: respiratory bypass system," he announced proudly.

"Oh, now you're just making words up again," Donna rolled her eyes. She had no idea with what kind of naive chicks the Doctor used to travel, but he wouldn't awe her with some techno blah-blah.

"Fine, I'll show you," he decided. Fascinated, Donna watched the Time Lord take a deep breath and then press his lips tightly together. Minutes past and nothing happened except that Donna was sure the TARDIS had never experienced so much silence.

"You're cheating!" Donna said after another couple of minutes past without the Doctor gasping for air. He didn't reply, still holding his breath, but he threw a challenging look at her.

Donna reached out to hold his nose. She was sure he was secretly breathing. Nothing happened but the Doctor demonstratively peeking at his watch. Finally Donna released him and sat back to admire his silent show a little longer.

"How do you do that?" she wanted to know. As an answer, the Doctor raised three fingers and tapped them against his wrist as if they were playing charade. 3 Words.

"This respirational passing nonsense?" Donna asked doubtfully.

"Respiratory bypass system," he spoke again and his voice sounded a little short of breath. "Saved my life umpteenth of times."

"No surprise you can run and run like that without ever stopping," Donna said and the Doctor smiled proudly that he'd once again proved how superior his physiology was to hers (and Jacks). Donna slowly started enjoy all the new information about her Martian, but all those advantages had to mean there were disadvantages, too... or not? The ginger was even more interested to learn about those, she mischievously recognized, someone must wipe that smirk off his face.


	3. Part 1c

**Part 1.c: Getting wasted**

Donna loved nothing as much as travelling in the TARDIS with the Doctor. Seeing all those places, meeting all those people and creatures and feeling more useful and important than she had felt in her entire life. She was sure she would never ever want to go back home. Unfortunately home had its way of closing in on her at times. Today had been one of those days.

Donna had been sitting in the library, waiting for the Doctor to finish his tinkering on the TARDIS and join her, when her upgraded mobile phone rang in her pocket. The ginger had answered the call from her mother and regretted it right away.

Sylvia Noble would just call her because of three things.

1. The world was positively going down.

2. Donna had done something

3. Donna had not done something

Today it had been the third reason – What Sylvia's stubborn daughter had refused to do was marrying and yet again Sylvia decided it was her task to push Donna a little more; she was sure Donna was just remaining single because she wanted to upset her mother. So the blonde woman told Donna about her good friend Nerys' wedding plans and how her baby twins loved their new father.

To cut a long story short, the call of her mother had been enough to remind Donna of one thing she would never find while travelling about – a husband. If she had to decide between a husband and the travelling she would always chose the latter, but this didn't mean she couldn''t lament about the lack of the first.

That was why, when the Doctor finally joined Donna in the library, she had made use of the TARDIS very own alcohol stock. Drinking until a problem was gone, how irresponsible was that? Well, she had needed something to do that she knew her mother wouldn't approve of. Alcohol seemed a good option.

Sniffling, she wiped the last tears out of the corner of her eye and sat up in her seat, a glass with some odd (but quite delicious) alien booze in her hand.

"Having a party?" the Doctor asked ironically, but with a worried undertone and his eyes wandered over the other bottles in front of Donna, two of them already empty. Donna didn't answer. Firstly, because he obviously knew the answer and secondly, because she wasn't sure how slurred her voice would sound.

He walked in slalom around the bottles and sat down next to Donna.

"Do you want to tell me what's wrong?" he asked gently.

Donna shook her head, it started swimming and she abruptly stopped.

"We-ll," he put a thoughtful look on and glanced about. "There's not much that can happen to make you sad in a library... Well, this library anyway. Except you read a really sad book. Did you read a sad book?"

Donna glared at him.

"I'm not crying because of a daft story!" she ranted. Oh, good. Her voice was still useable.

"A daft story?!" the Doctor wondered shocked. "There are many books worth crying for! Some authors simply create wonderful characters and then one day WHAM! They kill them and in such a case crying is a very appropriate way of dealing with such a loss."

Donna decided she was by all means too drunk to put up with this story again.

"Doctor, Dumbledore's dead since 8 years now, get over it," she replied annoyed and before the Doctor could complain about her pert answer she reached out for a bottle with an azure liquid in it and push it into the Doctor's hands. The Time Lord eyed it suspiciously.

"If I get drunk alone in the library it's just sad, but if you join me then..." Donna was sure the sentence had made sentence when she''d begun it. "it's not _that_ sad," she finished slowly.

"You could tell me what upsets you, instead. It's better than drowning it in alcohol," the Doctor reasoned but Donna knew she couldn''t tell him. Not yet. If she would mention the getting married thing he would either try to help her find a husband or he'd put that I-had-a-wife-once-but-now-she's-gone-look on and Donna knew she couldn''t handle either of his reactions.

"I'd rather not," she mumbled and took another sip.

She knew he was still worried and curious but she was all the more grateful when he just nodded, leaving well alone and taking a sip from the blue liquid. He put the bottle down again and grinned.

"I forgot how great this tastes."

The evening went by and Donna's bad mood finally lightened up. The Doctor could do what the alcohol had failed at and cheered her up, even though the booze helped making her giggle about all kinds of silly alien jokes.

The Doctor finished a pun about the Slitheen and Donna burst out into a fit of laughter that made her cry.

"Did you even understand that one?" the Doctor asked her with a slight chuckle.

"Not one word," Donna replied and giggled about the fact that she didn't.

"I guess that means you really had enough of that," the Doctor announced and gently pulled the bottle out of Donna's grip. She watched him collecting all the remnant of their evening and tried not to get distracted by his rather nice backside. Why hadn't she noticed that before? He certainly had a nice bum for such a skinny Martian. Donna snickered about her naughty thoughts but finally came to the conclusion that he may be right, she should head for bed before other parts of his anatomy would get interesting, too.

She sat up, careful not to lose her balance and had to hold onto the sofa firmly so she wouldn't simply fall off it. The Doctor watched her with an amused look.

"How does it come that you're hardly drunk?" Donna asked, even though she reckoned what actually left her mouth was "How you no drunk?"

"Time Lord trick," he winked at her. "Alcohol does affect us, but we can kind of... shrug it off."

"So you planned on staying sober, mean Martian," Donna accused him.

"Someone had to take care of you," the Doctor reminded her. "One day we can switch. Then I'll drink something and you'll look after me," he proposed and Donna nodded. She had no intention to walk all the way to her bed so she simply lay down on the soft couch in the library and snuggled into a big cushion.

"Wait! But you could just get sober again and then I'm useless. That's not fair!" she griped. The Doctor thought about that for a moment while putting a blanket over his companion.

"There's always the ginger beer...," he mumbled more to himself.

"Huh?" Donna raised her head attentively.

"Oh, nothing! Nasty stuff this ginger beer is, it has a way to get straight into our bloodstream and... well, the consequence is a very drunk Time Lord, nothing we should try."

Ugh, this sentence had been too long. Donna frowned and finally lay back against the pillow. She had no idea how this ginger beer worked, but one thing was sure. She had to get some of it onboard of the TARDIS... At least if she could remember it tomorrow.


	4. Part 1d

**Part 1.d: A matter of ancestry **

_A/N: I wasn't sure if I should publish this at all. It's kinda weird and pretty pointless, but then again I put some effort into the scenery, so I guess it's worth a try. As always: let me know what you think & how I can improve~_

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><p>The Harlequin-guard tilted its head at Donna, she saw him through the bars of the cell, and the shiny bells on its hat silently jiggled. At first those monochrome clowns had scared Donna silly, but now, two solid weeks in their clutches, the only thing she felt while looking at them was anger.<p>

She remembered the day she and the Doctor had come here. It had been the morning after she'd emptied half of the TARDIS's alcohol stock and suffered from the nastiest hang-over of her life. The Doctor had offered to take her to the most silent planet in creation and, feeling too sick to argue, Donna had agreed.

The planet turned out to be looking like an old movie, not only because of the lack of any colour, but also because the whole landscape showed criss-crossed glitches now and then, just like a broken telly. The only creatures living there were the natives, those colourless harlequins that never spoke a word. And since they never said anything, couldn't write or draw, they had no names.

Donna hadn't liked the planet much. The residents were creepy clowns who never talked and the surroundings looked like a broken TV-show, but at least it had been silent.

And then the Doctor had come.

The most talkative creature of all time on planet mute – Donna should have known this wouldn't end well and of course: Hardly twenty minutes after their appearance they had been thrown into prison. No one told them why, natch, but the ginger was sure the Doctor's voice had simply been too much for this planet.

This was partly why she was cross with her Martian. She was also annoyed because he hadn't found a way to escape, yet. Sharing a poky cell with him didn't exactly pour oil on the troubled water of their friendship, so they hadn't been talking to each other for two days. This meant there had been no _single_ sound in two days. The floor was designed to swallow every sound of footsteps and the shackles were muted, too.

Donna was sure that she was slowly losing her mind in all this silence and for the first time in ages she wished the Doctor would throw one of his endless monologues – of course she was too stubborn to ask him and he was too stubborn to simply start. They were in a stalemate.

The harlequin tilted its head at her again, just as if it was mocking her, and Donna poked her tongue out at it. The clown made a startled face. Donna grinned then she recognized a grin on the Doctor's face, too, from the corner of her eye. He saw her, seeing him and stopped smiling, instead he put his icy, pouting look back on and so did Donna.

She looked back at the harlequin and winced. The monochrome alien was poking its tongue out at her and now looked really creepy. When it recognized Donna's shock, it grinned like she'd done before and then stopped abruptly to look icily back at her, just like the Doctor. It was mimicking them.

Donna shuddered and pulled her legs up onto the seat of the bed. She hated those aliens. She wanted to go back to the TARDIS and she wanted a cup of tea and a real meal – not those colourless mashes.

And, first of all, she wanted her bathroom! Of course they offered them a loo and fresh water to shower and brush their teeth, but well… this was hardly enough. Donna's hair was a mess and to her misfortune she'd chosen to wear a dress that showed quite a lot of her legs. She hated how women in movies could spent years in dungeons or other hostile surroundings and always had perfectly shaved legs.

Her mood darkened even more when she threw a glare at the Doctor. Great, he looked brilliant, as if they had just left the blue box. Oh, she hated him for this the most right now. She wrapped her arms around her legs to hide them and rested her chin on her knees, death-glaring at the handsome Martian.

Until he caught her look. It must have looked really peeved because he instantly put his beaten-puppy look on. Now Donna felt guilty. She softened her look and sighed, finally she had had enough of this fight.

"Oh, stop looking at me like that," she told the Doctor who instantly smiled brightly at her.

"You're not mad at me anymore?" he asked and the words bubbled out of him. The punishment of silence really must have hurt him.

As an answer, Donna mumbled something undistinguishable into her wrists. He positively beamed at her.

"Great, because I'm working on a plan to get us out, don't worry! We'll be back with the old girl in a tick," he promised. "Of course I'm a little stuck with the plan, because, oh, I missed talking to you! I can never think when I have no-one to talk, you know? So, as I said, I'm just a little stuck, but now that we're talking with each other again I'm sure I can think of something!"

Donna rolled her eyes, amused. How had he managed to keep silent for that long? It nearly must have killed him, the stubborn git. While Donna kept thinking that to herself the Doctor hadn't stopped talking for a second.

"-which could be our way out if we don't mess it up and- what's wrong with your legs by the way? Are you hurt, Donna?" he suddenly changed the subject and eyed his companion up. Donna blushed and pulled her legs even closer to herself.

"No, I'm fine. Just get us out of here," she replied firmly.

"Are you sure? I've been watching you for the past days- Err, not on purpose , of course, just looking and recognizing- not that you're not worth watching, it's just- It'd be creepy and- Never mind, I just thought: She seems to be uncomfortable about her legs, that what I thought," now he was talking so fast the he was interrupting himself in doing so.

"Doctor, slow down or you'll bite your tongue off," Donna mocked. "And I am not hurt I just-," her cheeks burned embarrassed. "I'm just missing my own bathroom, alright?"

The Doctor frowned, obviously completely puzzled.

"They have a toilet, just down the corridor," he told her slowly, wondering how she'd managed to survive the past two weeks without that knowledge.

"Not that, dumbo!" she jabbed him in the ribs. "There are things a woman needs to do now and then and obviously those clowns've never heard of such problems." Donna shot him a don't-be-so-thick-glare.

The Doctor blinked blankly at her.

"So… it's that time of the month for you?" he carefully asked. In return Donna's face grew even redder.

"Not that!" she snapped angrily and the movement in front of their cell told Donna that the harlequin had never ever heard someone shout before and just jumped in shock. Grimly satisfied that she'd repaid the creep he'd given her, she leaned back against the cell wall and said, as nonchalant as possible: "I need a shave, ok. I know you blokes just expect women to exist with a smooth skin and all that, but the reality is different. Sorry to disappoint your expectations."

To her surprise the Doctor didn't look disgusted or embarrassed. He just chuckled softly.

"Are you laughing at me?!" Donna wondered hurt.

"No, why should I?" he smiled. "The smooth skin is just a temporary ideal of beauty in your culture. In fact humans still have the predisposition to grow a fur. Look at it as a memento from your ancestors. That's nothing to be ashamed of."

"Oi!" she exclaimed. "Are you calling me an ape?!"

"We-ll," he shrugged. Donna started hitting his arm and he had to take some steps back to escape her attack.

"You're such an idiot!" she growled. "Don't pretend the almighty Time Lords have always been like that! I bet your ancestors weren't much more glorious than mine!"

"I did not evolve from apes!" he replied. "In fact, Time Lords are closer related to Terileptil than to humans."

Donna remembered a reptile-like alien the Doctor had shown her some time ago, that he'd called "Terileptil".

"So that's why you look like you've smuggled a shaver in here?" she wondered annoyed. "Because your people evolved from frogs instead of apes? And that's something you feel superior for?"

The Doctor threw a hurt glare at her.

"We didn't evolve from them, we are just related."

"_Closely_ related."

"At least I don't have to worry about growing a fur after a few days!"

"Right, you couldn't grow a beard if you tried, Time_boy_!"

A gloved hand grabbed Donna's arm all of a sudden. She startled and turned around to see that two of the muted clowns had entered their cell. Before she or the Doctor could wonder what was going on, they were dragged out of the poky prison.

Finally they were out of there! Donna blinked up at the sun in the sky and a happy laugh broke form her lips.

"They let us out, but why?!"

The Doctor slowly rubbed his neck like he wasn't entirely happy about what just happened. Being thrown out of a prison seemed to be something new, even for him.

"Our row… I guess we've been a little _too_ loud for them so they simply chucked us out…"

Donna beamed. Maybe this meant they hadn't exactly made some new friends, but she could do without creepy clowns on her Christmas card list anyhow.

"That's fine with me," she said. "I just want to go back. I am knackered and I miss my bathtub."

The Doctor shook his head with a smile.

"Humans. You're so fragile. Sometimes I wonder how you manage not to get extinct."

"Oh, because you Time Lords are so much better than we are?" Donna asked, slowly she'd had enough of this nonsense.

"Not better, just… more carefully arranged."

Donna snorted and opened her mouth to shoot him a reply, but the Doctor interrupted her: "Let's not fight about this again. I thought you just wanted to go back to the TARDIS?"

"Fine," Donna agreed reluctantly and linked arms with the Doctor. "But this isn't over," she promised.

"I knew it wouldn't be that easy," he mumbled.


	5. Part 2a

**Part 2.a: Ginger beer onboard**

_Warnings: A tiny spoiler for The Time Of The Doctor, hardly worth mentioning really_

_A/N: Those of you who've been following my recent ranting know that I've had some trouble with this part of the story. Well, I finally managed to come up with something (I honestly lost track of how many "somethings" I came up with, but never mind)._

_Let me know what you think of this~_

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><p>The TARDIS was comfortably trundling through the vortex. It was her equivalent to a catnap and usually she was woken up by her thief switching her levers and pressing her buttons, telling her it was about time to search a new adventure.<p>

This time she woke up because the Doctor rambled through one of her selves. Usually, this was no reason for her to pay special attention to him, he used to look for things now and then to tinker, but the place he was searching was odd.

It was her alcohol larder.

Curiously she watched him for a moment. Like a mother who'd found her two-year-old playing with the telephone, she wondered what he could try with it and how exactly it would go wrong. Finally she couldn't contain this curiosity any longer and mentally asked him: _""Did you lose something?"_

"Not exactly. I know I've put it here, but I can't find it. Did you store the ginger beer away?"

Huh? This was really odd.

The Doctor sensed her confusion and explained: "I know, I know. I haven't forgotten what happened last time, but this is an emergency."

Not happy with where this was going the TARDIS slid a few of the boxes in her larder into his sight. They contained different kinds of alcohol he could always drink and get rid off when he wanted to. She knew her thief sometimes had the craving to get himself into a state of intoxication; this was why she _had_ all those different kinds of alcohol on board.

Wearily, the Doctor ruffled his hand through his hair.

"Those won't do, old girl. I need the ginger beer we hid," he explained, obviously not in the mood to argue with her – it seemed he had had this argumentation with himself already.

Half-heartedly trying to change his mind, the TARDIS let a bottle of his beloved banana-daiquiri roll forward on a board. He recognized it and smiled tiredly.

"Sorry, there's no other option for me today. It's for Donna, you see?"

This caught the ship's attention. She cared immensely for her Noble Lady and would support everything that would help her.

"She's been so melancholic lately and when I asked her what's wrong she- well at first she denied being sad at all, you know how she is.""

Indeed, the TARDIS knew her too well.

"But then she admitted she's feeling a little useless. Can you believe that? Who could be more of a help and support than she is to me?!"

The TARDIS couldn't think of one.

"I guess I've overdone the whole… emphasise of certain Time Lord characteristics a bit."

"_You've shown off without recognizing you've hurt her feelings."_

"No! I- well, I suppose you _could_ say it like that."

Ok, this made sense. He wanted to make up for this, but in how far did drinking support his apology?

"Do you remember when Donna had had one too many? She thought she could help me one day when I'd be a bit… drunk. So I''ll just take a quick sip of ginger beer, show her that I really need her and we'll be fine."

The TARDIS didn't like this plan. Not because she wouldn't support any kind of help for her Noble Lady but because she knew her thief tended to underestimate alcohol a little. Maybe because he usually didn't have to worry about any consequences; the wish to be sober again was enough for him to get rid of any problems.

"Don't worry! I made the mistake to underestimate this stuff before. I'm older and wiser now. Trust me, nothing can go wrong.""

x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Donna poured the steaming water from the kettle into two cups. Making tea, running alongside the Doctor – lately she felt like this was everything she could do. What else was there he needed her for anyway? He kept saying that he did and Donna knew he really wanted her to stay, she was grateful for that, but he simply dreaded the loneliness. If he had had the choice between Donna and someone who was at least almost a match to him, he would hardly choose her, would he?

Those last weeks had managed to make Donna very insecure. Even while the Doctor seemed human to her she'd often felt inferior to him, but now that he'd shown her all these abilities… She simply couldn't see what her place should be by his side. There were moments when she couldn't even remember why he'd invited her to come along in the first place.

Listlessly Donna raised the cups and startled. Shocked she dropped the cups that hit the ground and instantly broke; spilling the hot tea everywhere.

A frustrated growl escaped her throat; she didn't even seem to be able to make a bloody cup of tea. It took her a moment to realise what had actually startled her. The TARDIS seemed to poke at her mind. It was a nudging feeling inside of her that didn't really come from within. The ship urged her to go… where?

"Is something wrong, love?" Donna asked, facing the ceiling. Long ago, she'd realised that the ship had a consciousness of its own but they were yet to actually talk to each other. The TARDIS made herself heard by planting emotions, more shadows of emotions, in Donna's mind. This was urgency. But what for?

Donna's stomach tingled uncomfortably. She felt as if she needed to be somewhere but had forgotten where this somewhere was. Overwhelmed by the feeling, she ignored the mess at her feed and left the kitchen. The TARDIS egged her on, making her feel better or worse depending on where Donna walked. It felt like a creepy kind of blind man''s bluff that took place in her mind.

Warmer. Colder. At ease. Restless.

Finally Donna found herself standing in front of a small room. She knew it resembled a cinema. Well, at least a private one. Comfortable arm chairs, a sofa and a big screen for movies of all kinds.

The feeling of urgency positively zoomed through her veins. She _had_ to be here.

She pushed the doors to the cinema open and rushed inside. The feeling ebbed away, leaving Donna standing in the middle of the dim room, her socks soaking with the spilled tea and no clue where to proceed from here.

"What's it? Why did you bring me here?" she asked the ship when the sound of another voice made any answer unnecessary. Donna recognized it right away.

"Doctor?" she asked, looking about for the Time Lord. He didn't answer but it was his voice she could hear murmuring to himself. Slowly Donna walked around a big brownish sofa and spotted her Martian. He'd crouched down in front of a giant shelf with tapes, CDs, DVDs, microchips and other mediums Donna had never seen before.

"Err, Doctor?" she asked softly. It looked like he was about to watch a film and usually she would have left him alone; if he didn't ask her to join him, he probably wanted to be alone… but there was still the TARDIS's plead for her to come here fast.

Instead of an answer his murmuring grew louder.

"No. No. Nope. Oh, Rassilon, no! You look ri- Nop-y. And you. Why did I keep _you_?!... Possible blackmail maybe…"

While talking to no-one he started throwing the movies he'd sorted out over his shoulder. At first they just slid over the carpet to Donna's feet but then, in a moment of inattention in which Donna crept closer to watch him, a Blue Ray slipcase hit Donna''s head and killed every intention of waiting for an answer.

"Ouch! What the hell are you doing there, dumbo?!" she yelled.

The Doctor winced and, still in his crouching position, he turned around. It took him slightly longer than Donna's patience could stand, so she was at the end of her tether when he finally faced her and gave her a surprised smile.

"Donna!" he exclaimed happily and completely oblivious to what he'd done. The ice was getting thinner.

With a trembling voice Donna repeated: "I asked: what _the hell_ are you doing there?"

"I'm looking for a movie," he told her amused, obviously he had no idea how she could overlook that.

Donna opened her mouth to remark that she could well see that and that she hadn't come here to have a nice chitchat with him, but then realised that she had no real clue what she had come here _for_. The TARDIS had brought her here, giving her a feeling as if the Doctor was on the brink of death, but she was far too annoyed with him to accept the logical consequence to argue with the ship instead. It was easier to have a row with him. He could answer, he could apologize and, most importantly, he could be hurt by a slipcase hitting _his_ head.

"Yeah, well… thanks for the information Mr obvious!" she ranted. "But why are you aiming them at my head!? Besides, this room looks like a mess! All those movies and cases and cans lying on the floor. It looks like it's been hit by a bomb!"

Sheepishly the Doctor looked around as if he'd just realised the chaos and then, suddenly, glared at Donna with a worried look.

"I hit you! I'm so sorry, Donna, I didn't see you standing there!" he spluttered out.

This nudging feeling came back to her. This time it came from herself and it told her she was overlooking something… but what?

The Doctor stumbled to his feet and after a moment in which he had to struggle for balance he finally managed to rush over to Donna to check if he'd seriously hurt her.

"I'm so so sorry, Donna," he mumbled and carefully placed his hand under her chin to turn her head to the scarce light in this room. Standing so close to him, Donna could see his restless look and even recognise a new smell around him. Well, even ancient aliens were allowed to change their after-shave, weren't they?

"It's a little red… Oh, that'll make a bruise. Donna, I really really had no idea you where there. I need to be more careful, I could have hit your eye!"

Donna frowned at him. Blimey he was almost sobbing about that. Now she felt a little guilty for yelling at him. He hadn't recognized her after all.

"It's not that bad; really, it could have been worse" she tried to calm him. "I mean if you'd hit me with the Harry Potter collection box I'd be dead now," she joked.

"See, I almost killed you!" he exclaimed, shocked this time. Donna took a step back from him and eyed him up, for a moment suspecting if he was just pulling her leg but then another thought dawned on her. A thought that included the empty cans and the new smell.

"Are you drunk?" Donna glared at him. The Doctor instantly switched from worry- to defence- mode.

"What? No!" Suddenly he seemed to remember something: "Err- I mean, maybe. A little. Like you were before, I thought that could help.""

"Help with what?" she asked sternly.

"Not sure… I had it just a minute ago…," he put a thoughtful look on as if thinking hard but it took him longer than usual. After another minute of silence Donna waved her hand in front of his eyes.

"Are you still with me?" she mocked. He swayed a little and had to grab Donna's arm not to fall. Her move seemed to have sufficed to destroy the rest of his balance.

"Sorry, what?"

"Christ, you're completely hammered," Donna had to help him walk to the sofa. "I have no idea what you did that for, but obviously you overdid it a little. Get rid of the alcohol before you start singing crappy shanties or puke on my shirt or something."

"Can't," he told her and a grin spread over his face that was meant to look sly, but ended up kind of goofy. "That's part of the plan I forgot."

"What do you mean you _can't_?!" Donna glared at him. ""I saw you doing it! We polishing all this high-voltage booze off and you were completely fine just because you kept shrugging it off!"

"That just works with normal alcohol."

"And what's _ab_normal alcohol?!"

He leaned some closer to her to whisper: "Ginger beer," with a creepy voice that faded into a giggle.

"You are kidding me! You can't get pissed on beer! Gramps let me take a sip from his beer when I was 12 or so and it didn't do anything.""

Donna got up from the sofa to look at the cans the Doctor had dropped on the floor to see for herself.

"I can," he protested from the sofa. After Donna had stop propping him he'd fallen back against the backrest. "It's got something to do with the respa- respi-," he frowned at the mere complexity of the word. "The bypass-thingy and the two hearts. They pump it riiiight into my head.""

Donna stooped down to pick up a can and the Doctor made a curious sound that came close to a growl, she decided to simply ignore it.

"Did I ever tell you that you're brilliant?" the Doctor asked from the sofa.

"All the time," Donna simply replied because she felt he needed this concession now. Still focused on the can she tried to think of some alien alcohol the Doctor may had mentioned that was especially strong so it would even affect him. She couldn''t think of one.

"Gooood becaushu aaare," he slurred.

Donna smelled at the can. Hmm, smelled like normal ginger beer. Judging by the can it was probably from the future earth but it still was the same stuff she knew from home.

"And really nice… well also angry, sometimes I mean, but in a niiice way. Ya now?"

"Uh-hu."

This meant he really was drunk on beer. And there was nothing he could do to make it stop. Bugger!

"And so gorgeous, do you know that? I haven't seen such a nice rear since Cleo, oh she hated me calling her that," the Doctor chuckled to himself and Donna nodded, semi-distracted by the problem at hand when she suddenly glared at him.

"What did you just say?!"

"I was just thinking: Oh, I don't usually say that out loud, but then I thought: If she doesn't want me to look at her bottom what is she wearing this skirt for?""

With a burning face Donna opened her mouth to shoot an answer back but the Doctor kept babbling.

"I s'pose you could wear it because you like it… but I bet you don't like it half as much as I do. Looking at it, I mean, I'm not too eager on wearing it."

_Calm down, Donna_, she told herself. _If you kill him you're stuck here, you haven't had enough flying lessons, yet._

"How many have you had?" she asked with a trembling voice instead, her hand went down to the rim of her skirt to pull it down a little farther. Secretly she prayed for the Doctor's sake that he was really and completely pissed so he wasn't responsible for what left his mouth. He certainly wasn't aware of it anyway.

A long pause in which he used his fingers to count followed.

"3!" he finally announced.

3.

3 small cans of beer and he was completely out of his mind. It even seemed like it was getting worse the more time past as if there was still some alcohol in his blood stream that hadn't reach its final destination, yet.

Oh sh- sugar.

Donna rubbed her forehead and tried to think. After all the years of being a teenager with a mother like Sylvia she had to know a secret way to get rid of alcohol fast. Everything she could think of that really worked was time.

Oh, the irony thinking that onboard of a time machine that could do nothing about it.

"Alright, Spaceman, let's get you to bed and sleep it off. Tomorrow you can tell me why you drank the only alcohol in the world that you can't shrug off while I skin you alive, how does that sound?" Donna turned back to the sofa to find it empty. After a second of panic she spotted the Doctor in front of another shelf with movies.

"What are you doing?!" she snapped.

"Looking for a movie."

"Yeah, we've had that conversation before," Donna remarked. With a deep sigh she tried to calculate her options. She could hardly force him to go to bed and if she was really lucky he would find what he was searching for and fall asleep while watching a film.

The problem was that slowly he seemed to suffer from tunnel vision. He held every cover very close to his eyes and it still took him minutes to decide. Rolling her eyes, Donna took pity on him and pulled a DVD out of his hands.

"Just tell me which one you need," she said and sat down on the floor next to him.

"A vampire film," he told her. "I wanted to show it to you since forever! I watched it with Martha once and she was positively in love with it. She even said I look like one of the actors."

"No wonder she loved it, the poor girl," Donna mumbled to herself. She knew well about Martha's obsession with a certain Martian and how it hadn''t ended well for her.

"An actor who looks like you? Hmm, I'd say your almost-lethal Harry Potter collection. I just recently thought you look like that bloke in part 4. You know, the one with the tongue issue?"

The Doctor made an offended sound. "He doesn't look like me at all! No, it was a vampire movie anyway."

"Let's see what we've got here then," Donna chuckled and looked at the "V" board for "Vampire".

"Good old Dracula maybe?"

He snorted. "Do I look like Dracula? No! One from your time!"

"But there are millions of vampire movies since this stupid book about this sparkling git was published!" she exclaimed annoyed. "Please don''t tell me it's Twilight you were searching for!?"

"No-o!" the Doctor whined. "One with a character that looks like me-he."

"Right now? Sorry, can't think of a vampire movie with Charley Sheen in it."

The Doctor really seemed offended by that. He snatched the movie Donna was holding from her hands and pouted: "If you don't want to help me at least stop making rude comments!"

Donna made room for him to continue the search on his own, but in his current state he could hardly pull out a DVD without two others falling to the ground. She watched him grumpily looking for the mysterious movie while his ability to read clearly had abandoned him.

She just couldn't think of a reason why the Doctor, who always made sure he could emphasis his intelligence, would drink himself senseless. Sure, he'd done stupid things before out of mere boredom – Donna kept mocking him that one day he'd try and shave his head just because there was nothing else left to do – but this hardly looked like an attempt to have some fun. Drinking for fun was best done with friends or at least at a party but not alone in a poky room before looking for something... What had the silly prawn been up to?

"It's no use, Spaceman. Let's watch it tomorrow when you're sober again," Donna proposed.

"Go to bed, I'll be alright," he replied and almost sounded firm if not for a sudden hiccup sabotaging him. Why was he so annoyed that she didn''t want to support this silly search?

Fed up with him and his irrational drunkenness, Donna got up, ready to leave him to whatever the ginger beer would do to him. It wasn't her fault if he was doing something so silly as to drink the only alcohol that could actually harm him.

No. This was none of her business. Who cared what would happen to him.

In the end it was the pathetic little hiccup that made her stop and turn around. He really looked pitiful down there on the ground. Almost as pitiful as she'd felt the day her mother had called and the Doctor had done everything he could to cheer her up... without even demanding an explanation for why she was sad.

"There's Fight Night," Donna mumbled, slowly walking back to him. "I guess you could say this weirdo in leather pants looks remotely like you. Just remotely, mind you! He isn't half as skinny as you are and he can hold his liquor."

"That's it! Now we just have to find it," he cheered and with the forgiveness of someone who was drunk as a lord he forgot he was cross with her. Well, or he''d really just forgotten it. Donna decided to give him the credit for not demanding an apology anyhow.

"Need help?" she asked softly. The Doctor budged over for her to sit down and, after she'd pulled him back up from his back, they searched for the movie together.

"Always," he said out of the blue and Donna shot him a side-glance.

"Always what?" she asked the Doctor who was suddenly very focused on his task.

"Need your help. I always do."

"You're just a bit drunk and this movie seems to be a ninja when it comes to hiding. You're alright on your own," Donna mumbled, not sure if this was the best time to discuss this matter.

"No!" he objected. Donna turned around to him, surprised by his sudden firmness. This didn't just seem to be a mood swing she owed to the ginger beer, the Doctor really struggled to make something clear to her.

"It doesn't matter what I am or what I can. I do need you, Donna Noble. To stop me and to support me. I don't even know for what else because it''s so much! For company and for sanity and… and to search weird movies with me while I'm drunk on this stupid beer we'll dump on the next planet we land on, which is probably… Clom. Not the best idea maybe, especially if they figure why I wanted to get rid of it and..." He blinked puzzled.

"You- You've forgotten what you were saying in the first place, haven't you?" she asked softly.

"I know it was important… Did I manage to get the point across before I spaced out?" he asked worried and for some reason Donna had to admit that he had. This confession or plead or whatever it had been that was completely drowned in ginger beer, had told Donna that he really meant it. That the thought of losing her scared him immensely. Not the one of being on his own, but of being without _her_.

"Yeah, I got what you meant," she told him and blinked a tear away.

"But it made you sad!" he state shocked.

"No, it made me very happy, you silly brilliant Martian," she replied and pressed a kiss to his cheek to wipe the confusion from his face. It was pretty wet because of her tears but she couldn't think of a moment when she'd felt so close to her Martin before.

She pulled back and gave him a grateful smile he replied somewhat hesitantly, sometimes Donna wondered what was going on in this head of his.

"Glad to hear it worked," he mumbled and leaned in closer until his head rested against Donna's shoulder. The poor Martian really had lost all sense of balance it seemed. ""I can't stand seeing you sad."

Donna looked down at him, touched by the sadness in his own voice while saying that.

"Same here, sunshine," she told him softly. Raising her voice to more than a whisper seemed unnecessary with their noses practically touching. She'd never paid special attention to it, but from up close she could count those small freckles on his face.

Catching herself staring, Donna blushed and decided it really was about time to go back searching a certain movie.

"Need help sitting up?" she offered and was surprised to find him shaking his head.

"Didn't fall over," he admitted, focusing his dark eyes on hers. Donna felt his breath against her skin while he spoke, it smelled distinctively like ginger beer.

_I haven't had this stuff in ages_, she thought, her eyes fluttering shut as his mouth found hers.

Her tummy tried a little back flip inside of her and her fingers had to curl into the soft carpet so she wouldn't simply fall over herself. Before that could happen the Doctor propped her with his hands on her arms.

She leaned in closer to let her mouth softly embrace his lower lip. He made a muffled noise that sounded faintly like a mix of approval and a dying hiccup, but it was enough to pull Donna back to reality.

Abruptly she sat back from the Doctor who swayed a little in his struggle for balance.

He blinked confused as if cruelly being woken up from a pleasant dream but Donna's thoughts were rushing through her head, because this was just the problem. He was dreaming. Almost. He was completely drunk, not even able to find a stupid movie and she expected him to make such a decision?

"Sorry," she whispered shocked.

"Did I do something wrong?" he asked.

"No, you-" Donna felt choked so it took her some effort getting the sentence out properly. "No, you didn't do anything, but we- we were searching for your film, remember?"

She was right, he wasn't himself and she'd made use of that. Trying to distract herself, Donna returned to looking for this Vampire DVD.

_Find the film, get him to bed, get yourself to bed_. She tried to provide herself with some tasks just to keep functioning, at least one of them had to.

"Donna, I'm s-"

"Don't be," she interrupted him. "You didn''t do anything. You're drunk and tomorrow this will be nothing but a blurry mess in your memory. Not even that. It never happened, alright?"

"I kissed you," he objected weakly.

"No!" Donna's voice had slipped up an octave. "I kissed your cheek. That was everything. The rest was your imagination."

"Donna," he tried.

"Where is this silly movie?!" she cried out. In her confusion and frustration she grabbed Nosferatu and threw it across the room. "Why can''t stuff be where it's supposed to be?! It's such a chaos here!" Her voice gave up and faded into a silent sobbing.

_Well done, Donna_, she scolded herself mentally. _So very well done._

She hung her head so her hair would hide the sight of her tears. Why did this shocker her at all? Stuff like that happened alcohol-related and she never liked him in that way, so why did it hurt her like that?

While trying to pull herself together, in vain, she felt the Doctor move away from her side just to crawl back a minute later. Walking didn't seem possible anymore for both of them.

Slowly she raised her head to find out what he was doing. He fought against another can of ginger beer. Maybe he had already forgotten everything again... More likely he was trying to do something to cheer Donna up, she had no idea, maybe none of the above.

Finally the lid of the can gave in and the foamy liquid fizzed out. The Doctor caught it with his mouth and after a sip shuddered as if he'd drunken pure whiskey. Donna pulled it away from him before he could get any more of it.

"You're already drunk as a _Time_ Lord, are you trying to get yourself killed?" she sniffled annoyed. The anger about his careless behaviour temporarily drowned the anger she felt for herself. Frustrated she raised the can to her mouth and emptied it with one sip.

"Donna!" he exclaimed.

The ginger licked her lips, lowering the can.

"Don't get your knickers into a twist. It's beer for heaven's sake and for a human that's almost water."

A lie. She felt the warmth of alcohol spreading from her stomach all through her body, but it was just this feeling of warmth killing the coldness inside of her, that had followed the kiss, she had needed.

"We can watch the movie some other day," he offered and Donna nodded distantly. Later she realised this offer to drop his oh-so-important plan was probably something really generous to his drunken mind.

"Are you tired?" she asked hopefully.

"No, I feel just a bit sick," he admitted and when Donna looked at him she recognized his face had lost all colour.

"You look horrible!" she jumped to her feet and carefully helped him to get up, too. Now wasn't the time to feel hurt or confused, she just hoped he hadn''t gotten himself an alcohol poisoning.

"Let's get you to bed then-" Her instructions were interrupted by the Time Lord vomiting over Donna's shirt.

"Sorry," he whispered.

"I had this coming," Donna replied tiredly. Now she looked pretty much like she felt. "It's just too bad you decided to go for puking instead of an old shanty. Anyways: Bed! Allons-y."


	6. Part 2b

**Part 2.b: Keeping warm**

A/N: This part wasn't even supposed to be in here, but I felt like the Doctor and Donna really deserve some proper aftermath/solution for their ginger beer misery… You know I'm no good at writing conversations which should solve "emotional" problems *ick!* but, well, see what you can make of it~

* * *

><p>The Doctor woke up because something or someone was trying to kill him from within his skull. He had no idea what kind of villain this was or what he wanted from the Time Lord, but no matter which planet he tried to conquer, it was all his! Oh for Rassilon's sake, the Doctor just hoped he would kill him soon before the pain would drive him mad.<br>It took him some agonising moments to figure that no alien had wound its way into his head for means of torture but that he was simply hung over.

Ohw, no, there was nothing "simple" about this hangover. He growled as he realised there was no merciful death in reach and rolled to his side.  
>Bed. He was lying in a bed, considering the feeling it was his own. He didn't dare to open his eyes though.<p>

"_Can I help you to make it better?"_ the TARDIS asked in his mind but the Doctor simply escaped further down under the sheets. _"Please don't come in here again,"_ he whimpered mentally. His head already felt as if it was about to burst. It certainly couldn't take another presence.

He tried to find a comfortable position in which neither his head nor his stomach rebelled against him so he could die in peace, but it wasn't until he found an especially soft pillow to rest his head on that he could lie still. It probably came from the TARDIS because he couldn't remember owning such a nice cushion. It was soft, pleasantly warm and smelled remotely like vanilla. He snuggled deeper into it and sent a silent _"Thank you,"_ to his old girl. She took respect on his plead and didn't answer.

He let out another tormented growl, because it seemed to ease the pain when he made himself heard, but he hadn't expected to get an answer. A soft sigh came from the pillow he'd buried himself in and, even though the sound wasn't unpleasant, it seemed slightly odd for a pillow to sigh at all.

Or stir.

He was still determined to keep his eyes shut, even as he felt the pillow wriggle and turn in his hug until a drowsy, very un-pillow-like voice mumbled: "Morning, sunshine."  
>"D-Donna?" he asked very faintly.<br>"Hm-hm," she mumbled.  
>The Doctor felt his hearts skip a beat. A hangover. Donna in his bed. No memory of the past hours.<br>Death seemed to become more and more merciful.

"W-why are you here?" he stuttered.  
>"You asked me to."<br>Right. Great. Except that he had still no idea what the hell had happened.  
>Finally the Doctor opened his eyes to look at his companion. Her bright red hair laid spread out on his white pillow. Then she gave him a very tired smile and for a moment an image of a crying Donna popped into his head. He had no idea where it came from, but she wore the same smile… something buzzed through his body together with the image.<p>

_Get a grip! Find out what happened or things are going to get really complicated!_ He snapped himself out of it.

"A little more information would be wonderful."  
>"You got drunk and don't ask me why, because you never told me." Donna started explaining with a yawn. "I found you searching for Peter Vincent and tried to help you, but we couldn't find him anywhere. You puked on my shirt and trousers and… well pretty much everything nearby. Oh, and you almost killed me with a DVD! I mustn't forget that, because it sounds pretty hilarious. That's basically everything that happened. Then I got you to bed and changed you into your pyjamas - don't worry, I didn't peek – but you didn't take a shower, because I was worried you might drown, so you still have to do that on your own."<p>

This didn't sound too horrible. Fine, not great either but at least he hadn't done something stupid that would make everything complicated like getting physical with Donna!... That was a good thing, he reckoned.

"And then… you spent the night here?"  
>"I told you, you wouldn't let me go!" Donna justified with a light blush and pulled the blanket up to her chin. "After I'd told you, you might drown in your shower you refused to stay here alone so close to it, eventually I gave in. Sorry, if you're uncomfortable about it I can just lea-"<br>"No!" he protested quickly and after he realised how firm he'd sounded, he added somewhat softer: "No, I appreciate you were looking after me while I was being impossible."  
>"Nah, you were… challenging, that's everything. Don't worry about it."<p>

This was nice of her. Very nice actually… He didn't even get a normal blow to the arm even though he certainly deserved one. It made him feel quite uneasy that Donna was suddenly so scarily understanding.

"So… that's everything? There's nothing else I did? Something I need to feel sorry for, I mean."  
>Donna put on a mock-thoughtful look. To him it seemed more as if she was just trying to escape a serious answer though.<br>"Let's see. Getting senselessly drunk, hitting my head and puking all over me. No, I guess that's all. Why? Did you plan something more?"

"No. Sorry for all that," he replied sheepishly and tried to ignore the unsettling feeling of something else he'd done. Something worse…

"Apology accepted. What do you think about getting up now? I need a shower and, seriously, so do you. Then you could finally fly me to that beach you keep promising me, so I can really forgive you," Donna proposed and slipped out of the bed. He frowned at her for a second; she was wearing nothing but a skinny shirt that merely covered everything… that needed covering, but then he remembered he'd ruined her clothes last night.

He hesitated to answer her. A beach would be hot and dazzling and everything he wanted was his bed, darkness and maybe a bit more of that cuddling with Donna against the hangover, but then she certainly deserved some hiatus after the horrible night he'd brought her.

"That's a deal," he agreed.  
>Donna nodded, scurrying out of the room without another word. The vague desire to reach out to grab her arm and pull her back hit him but he led it ebb away, as usual. He probably smelled like an old bar, he couldn't blame her for escaping this bed as soon as possible.<br>Slowly he rolled out of his bed and stumbled into the bathroom.

Guilt, hurt pride, a bit more self hatred than usual. Of course, headache and nausea could never be the only punishment for getting wasted on ginger beer.  
>Well, at least he didn't look as rubbish as the bloke who stared at him from within the mirror. His hair was sticking up into all directions, his skin was unhealthily pale and his eyes bloodshot. The poor chap.<br>Groggily the Doctor swallowed some pain pills and turned the shower on.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x

"Beach, Spaceman," Donna stressed. "I said _beach_." She stood in front of the Doctor in a light summer dress, wearing just her swimsuit beneath it and frowned at the big, fluffy coat he held out for her to wear.

"And a beach it is, a really beautiful one by the way, but the weather is kind of… moody here, so wear this over your dress." The Doctor handed Donna the coat. He looked a little better than before, still tired but all in all healthy. Donna eyed him up suspiciously.

"Just in case," he added. The Doctor himself held a fluffy coat in his arms, Donna couldn't imagine him wearing that monstrous brown thing over his swimming trunks. It was just too big and too fluffy, just like Donna's. It seemed as if he'd bought them together; a set of matching coats, this was probably cute but Donna's attention was somewhere else.

"'Moody'?" she repeated. "As in: it's rainy one day and the next it's sunny?" Somehow she doubted whether it'd be that easy.  
>"Well, err… no, not really. More like in, it's really really hot at daytime and really really cold at night-time." When he recognised Donna's quizzical look he added: "it's the most beautiful weather to go for a swim as long as the sun's up, I promise. We just have to leave before dawn."<p>

With a final sigh, Donna gave in and stuffed the coat into her bag.  
>"Alright, but we better <em>are<em> back before the weather changes," she warned but her glare only lasted so long. She was looking forward to a day on the beach. She needed some distraction and she needed it _now_. Thoughts were praying on the back of her mind she didn't want to start thinking about. Thoughts about last night, about the two of them and how she'd allowed everything to go too far-

"Donna, are you ready?" the Doctor asked and Donna recognised that he was already standing by the door, waiting for her. Pulling herself together she fetched her bag for the beach and joined him.  
>Yes, she needed this day out of the TARDIS. In here she'd only keep brooding and in the end she'd burst out with a confession that had no room between the two of them.<p>

x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x-x

She should have known. Maybe she had known, but didn't want to admit it. Maybe she'd just been naive believing they could ever make it back to the TARDIS before any kind of deadline.  
>The blazing sun fought hard against dawn, but slowly it drowned behind the horizon and with every passing minute the temperature fell.<p>

She glared at the back of the Doctor's head as they were walking back to the TARDIS, knowing he wasn't to blame, not really. The octopus people had needed their help and she hadn't hesitated a moment to follow the Doctor, but all this time a tiny, delicate, pinkish part of her mind had believed they would make it back in time.

Donna shivered and pulled the fluffy coat tighter. She sent a silent thank you to the past Doctor for talking her into wearing this.  
>"How far is it still?" she asked, raising her voice so the Doctor would hear it through the upcoming wind that blew icily in her face.<br>"Two miles, maybe three," he replied and Donna's stomach convulsed. The sun was gone now and within seconds twinkling stars appeared. The nights on this planet were short, but so were the days.

The Doctor turned around to Donna with a worried expression.  
>"Can you go that far?" he asked.<br>"If I have to," she said, sounding much more confident than she felt.  
>He nodded and reached his hand out for her to grab but for some reason she couldn't. She stared at it, as if it was some kind of poisonous animal he'd asked her to hold. Fast she hid her hands in the pockets of her coat.<br>"It's getting really cold," she mumbled and started walking again. After a second of confusion the Doctor followed her, not questioning her behaviour for which she was more than grateful.

About half an hour later, Donna had to learn that she would not make it just because of mere stubbornness. The former green heels around the beach were now covered in a thick layer of frost that crunched beneath their feet with every step. The real problem for Donna was the wind though. Mercilessly it blew every kind of remaining warmth off her, and by now she was positive her nose had frozen off.  
>With stiff fingers she tried to pull the hood of her coat deeper into her face and failed, the frost-shattered fabric kept escaping her fingers.<p>

After a few tries the Doctor must have recognised her struggle, he turned and fixed Donna's hood for her. She watched his eyes that were fixed on the strap of her coat, they were so different from last night, focused and bright and for a second she wondered whether a kiss now, while he was sober, would bring the expression back she'd seen that night-  
><em>Oh, God make him hurry up!<em> She silently prayed. _Before I do something really stupid!_

"I think I've seen a cave over there," the Doctor told her as soon he was done and Donna's heart stopped racing and sank instead. She shook her head; the last thing she wanted was to spend any longer out here than necessary.  
>"We are going there, Donna, you're freezing and I want to get you out of the wind. Don't even try to argue!"<br>She really just wanted to go back to the warm ship, but the look on the Doctor's face told her she wouldn't win this.

Reluctantly she gave him a short nod and together they hurried up the hill towards the place where the Doctor believed to have seen a cave. On her way Donna slipped on the icy ground and fell face-first onto the frozen grass. Her arms seemed too stiff to even try and cushion her fall. It took all her strength to push herself back up on her knees while she just wanted to lie there and sob like a child.  
>Instantly the Doctor was at her side and gently, as if he feared she might shatter every second, pulled her up. Just then Donna recognised that his hands were warm, compared to the rest of this bloody ice-world. For the last yards she held onto him with a death-grip.<p>

The second they reached the gap in the rock the wind was gone and Donna felt better right away. Sure, it was still freezing cold in there, but at least this goddamn wind was gone.  
>Beyond exhaustion, she slid down at the wall of the cave and tried to warm her face up with her hands, or maybe vice versa, she had no idea. It wasn't working anyway, there was no warmth left in her that could have spread.<br>After a few moments she gave up. It didn't matter; nothing mattered now that she finally had escaped this horrible wind. She leaned her head back against the wall and closed her eyes.

"Donna!" the Doctor shook her shoulder and she almost missed his earlier over-caution. "Don't scare me like that!"  
>"I was just resting," Donna griped, at least she tried to, her fear and exhaustion resonated in her voice and made it sound all whiny.<br>"You were falling asleep and you know how dangerous that is," the Doctor warned and crouched down next to her. His eyes scanned her, as if he was trying to measure the level of her hypothermia.

"I can't light a fire, there's nothing here I could burn," he explained to her and Donna suddenly hated their past selves for not taking anything inflammable with them.  
>"It's okay, I just need a moment to warm up, then-"<br>"No," the Doctor interrupted her firmly and searched his pockets as if he hoped he would find something to make a fire with in there. Well, Donna might have believed he would find something if he'd been wearing his normal coat, but the pockets of this fluffy one were all but empty.  
>"The temperature's still falling and we have about a mile to go."<p>

Donna gulped. It was still getting colder and they still had so far to walk. Tears sprang to her eyes before she could do something about it. She'd reached her limit and had no idea how to take just another step out there, let alone a solid mile.  
>"No, don't cry, we'll be fine, you know we will," the Doctor soothed her and cupped her face with his hands. Donna had no idea how this was possible but they were warm, actually and really warm. It wasn't just compared to the freezing temperature around; they felt as warm as they always did.<p>

"I don't think I can walk that far," she mumbled and sniffed her numb nose.  
>"Of course not! I'm not letting you go out there again, we'll spent the night here and tomorrow, when the sun's up, we'll simply walk back to the TARDIS," he gave her an encouraging smile and Donna smiled back, closing her eyes and enjoying his warmth for a moment. It was a wonderful feeling that made her stomach loop and reminded her so much of-<p>

She had no idea where the power for that came from, but suddenly she pulled her face out of his touch and slide away from him. Bewildered by her reaction the Doctor blinked at her, his hands still raised to where Donna's face had been a split second ago.

"What's wrong?" he asked.  
>"Nothing!" she replied harsher than she'd wanted and added and apologetic look, unable to find the right words. The questioning expression on his face changed to a resigning one.<br>"Fine." He averted his eyes and sat back against the stone wall, too, leaving enough room for a third person between the two of them.

Donna coiled herself up against the cold and rested her face against her shivering legs. It wasn't bad enough that she'd made use of him while he was drunk and vulnerable, no, she had to keep thinking about it all day long like some kind of pervert. She couldn't have him know it and the only way to do that was too keep the distance between them.

Donna squeezed her eyes shut. She hated distance between them, almost as much as she hated this coldness. By now she felt even too stiff to shiver anymore, her whole body was frozen and slowly this seemed to rub off on her mind. She wanted her own bed, this was the only thought that made any sense before she faded off into the dark…

"Hey! Donna, hey, wake up!"  
>Donna startled and slowly opened her eyes. Heavy lidded she blinked at the Doctor.<br>"You can't sleep now," he stated slowly but firmly. "Do you hear me? Stay awake!"

Had she fallen asleep? It didn't feel like it, she was still tired and her position wasn't exactly comfortable, but right now she didn't mind. She really just wanted to sleep…

"_**Donna**_!" he yelled as her eye closed again. He could be really loud if he wanted to. "Listen, I know you're tired but if you fall asleep your muscles will stop working, your whole body stops keeping you warm and if that happens I won't be able to help you!"

Ugh, Donna knew he was right, she'd seen enough melodramatic snow-storm movies to know she had to stay awake, but no-one had ever told her she would feel that tired before freezing to death.  
>"Can you stand up?" he asked. "If you walk about for a bit, maybe-"<br>Donna shook her head before he finished the sentence. She could hardly move her fingers, how was she supposed to move her whole body?

Anxiously the Doctor scanned the cave with his eyes, rotating as he did so, trying to think of a way to keep her warm but with a final spin he gave up on finding something in this abandoned hole and sat down next to Donna. He opened his arms for her.  
>Donna blinked suspiciously at him.<p>

"I'm warmer than you; you recognised that, right?" he asked.  
>"I thought Time Lords did have a <em>lower<em> body temperature," Donna mumbled.  
>"Right, that's why the weather didn't affect me as much as you," he explained. "I could save my warmth up and I don't need much of it anyway," he slid closer to her. "Come here."<br>Finally it dawned on Donna what he was about to do and she backed off, still pressing her back against the wall. A hug was pretty much the opposite of the distance she needed!

"No thanks, I can manage," Donna told him fast.  
>The Doctor frowned at her.<br>"You're freezing, Donna!"  
>"Well, duh! It's pretty cold, but that's no reason to-," she didn't finish the sentence, instead she just gestured at his still open arms.<br>They watched each other, Donna nervous and the Doctor slowly losing his patience.  
>"What is the problem?" he asked and lowered his arms. Donna could hear he wasn't about to accept cheap excuses anymore… Unfortunately those were the only ones she had. She didn't answer; she couldn't even look at him.<p>

"Is it me?" he questioned. "Did I do something to offend you?"  
>"No, 'course you didn't," she mumbled.<br>"What else is it? Are you scared of me? Disgusted with me? I took a shower and I usually never puke, unle-"  
>"No! No, that's not even close, it's…" Desperate to find the right words, Donna rubbed her hand over her forehead just to recognise it was numb.<br>"What?!" he pressed.

She took a deep, ice-cold breath, trying to calm herself.  
>"It's nothing, I just- We hug quite often, did you notice that? Maybe I'm just... spent."<br>"Oh, I didn't… Sorry, I had no idea it's that annoying for you" he mumbled, putting that look on she'd last seen on his face when she'd told him she wouldn't join him on his travels. She hated seeing him like that. What was the use of keeping the truth from him if her lies hurt him just as much?!  
>"No, that's not it," she admitted quietly and a part of her hoped the Doctor wouldn't hear her. Of course he did.<p>

"Huh?"  
>"Err I don't think it's even possible, you know? Feeling spent about hugs… It's not like it's exhausting - hugging I mean," she stuttered.<br>_What are you talking about?!_ A voice inside her asked, shocked. Why did her mouth only come up with rubbish when she was trying to talk to someone about her feelings?  
>"What else is it? What could be so horrible that you can't tell me?" the Doctor wanted to know, his dark eyes boring into Donna and for the first time she couldn't reply his look because she felt too ashamed of herself. This was it, he'd never forgive her. How would he react once he knew? He'd throw her out, that much was sure, but would he even bother to stop in Chiswick? He could just as well leave her here…<p>

Nonsense! He never would abandon her at a place like that, he was her friend.  
>Donna clenched her fists. Right, he was her friend and he deserved to know the truth. Her punishment would be his decision and she would accept it.<p>

"Something's happened last night," she said, actually she whispered it. "I did something and I didn't know how to tell you."  
>The Doctor tilted his head and his angry expression vanished.<br>"What did you do?" he asked so gentle that Donna felt a lump blocking her throat. She turned her head toward the Doctor and tears rolled down her cheeks.  
>"I'm sorry, I really am," she wept. "It happened so fast and I should have stopped you, I know I should but-"<p>

Her apology faded into a sobbing that was muffled by the Doctor wrapping his arms around her. Donna didn't push him away this time, she just buried her face into this big, fluffy coat until she found his chest. God, he hadn't lied, he was toasty. She just wanted him to keep holding her like that in his warm, soothing embrace but she knew she couldn't. She didn't deserve it and he needed to know.

She fought her way back to look at him with wet eyes.  
>"We kissed," she told him as brave as she could with a dying sob cracking up her voice.<br>A beat of silence followed her words in which Donna felt first relief and then panic hitting her. Relief because it was _finally_ out and panic because it was finally _out_.  
>"Say something!" she begged him after another moment of agonising silence.<p>

"So… that's it? Is there nothing more about to come?" he asked, genuine confusion on his face.  
>"More?" Donna exclaimed. "This has been on my mind all day long! In the TARDIS, with the octopus people, in the storm! What more do you want?!"<br>"Exactly! You were all weird today and I thought there was something more to it then just this kiss. You can't blame me for being a little nervous about it! After this moment my memory fades to black and we woke up in the same bed after all. I thought you were about to tell me we did something really silly."

Donna gaped at him.  
>"You remember it?! I was freaking out about this for hours and you just remember it!?" she swatted at his arm and regretted it right away because her frozen hand started hurting even more.<br>"Sorry, but you never told me it freaks you out… I'm still not sure if I get this. Why do you feel sorry for it? At least it was me kissing you, not the other way round."  
>"I should have prevented it! You were vulnerable and I should have protected you, not-"<br>The Doctor suddenly started chuckling and interrupted Donna. She hit him again, despite the agony in her hand.

"Stop laughing at me! I was really scared you'd be angry with me!"  
>"Sorry," he replied, still smiling like she'd told him a joke. "But I wasn't vulnerable, Donna. I was drunk and daft and crossed a line - if there's someone who needed protection it was you." Somewhere along this sentence his expression changed from a smile into a bitter frown that made Donna want to hug him again, not only because he was nicely warm.<br>"It's not like you'd have harmed me," she replied quietly.  
>"Oh, no?" he asked. "I crossed one line, who knows if I didn't go farther? What I remembered was just a quick peck, but if it keeps troubling you like that… That's why I hate this ginger beer! You just can't get rid of it."<p>

Donna tried to curl her frozen lips into a smile and softly rested her palm against his cheek.  
>"I've no idea what you remember, but the Doctor I spent last night with was no harm to anyone. He was a little silly but very nice to me. And the kiss… actually it was hardly more than a peck."<p>

The Time Lord didn't look completely convinced but at least this self-loathing frown vanished from his face.  
>"Are you sure?" he asked.<br>"Positive, I was just panicking because I felt guilty. Thinking about it, I'm not even sure if there was any line-crossing involved. It was probably just a friend-kiss."  
>"There are things like 'friend-kisses'?" he wondered and took Donna's icy hands in his. Slowly he raised them to his mouth to breath some warmth upon them.<p>

"S'pose so," Donna mumbled, distracted by the sensation of her hands coming back to life. Somehow the warmth found a way from her hands to her face. "My best friend and I used to kiss when we were teenagers, especially when one of us was drunk, but we never went any further. It's just a way to be close to a good mate."  
>"We're <em>best<em> mates," he pointed out, holding Donna's hands close to his face.  
>"We are," she agreed a little light-headed with the heat that had found its way back into her. The Doctor pressed his lips briefly to Donna's hands and smiled, a mixture of mischievousness and caution about Donna's reaction were playing about his lips.<br>"Does it work like that?" he asked when Donna made no attempts to pull her hands away. "Those friend-kisses."

Donna felt that her mouth was suddenly very dry. She was sure the Doctor was just being curious as always, eager to learn something new. The fact that her motives weren't all that innocent should be no reason for her to deny him this experience.  
>"Not really," she moved closer to him and faintly recognised that the warmth he was sending out surrounded him like an aura. "It's more a like a normal kiss, just… less."<p>

She saw him silently wondering if he could dare to try it and Donna hoped he wouldn't sense her anticipation. After a moment that seemed to last the whole damn night he finally close the distance between them and brushed his lips over hers.  
>A shy heartbeat, hardly enough to remind her of last night, then he pulled back.<p>

"Like that?" he asked.  
>"Uh-hu," Donna nodded flustered, craving more but not ready to admit it. "That's it."<br>Their eyes met and Donna pressed her lips tightly together in order to lock the longing sigh in that was stuck in her throat. God, something _was_ wrong with her, but who cared? He wasn't angry with her after all.

"I'm glad we could clear everything up," the Doctor told her. "I hate fighting with you."  
>"Same here, Spaceman," she agreed and recognised that she was truly happy about it. Despite all those nagging emotions swirling around in her, she was glad to have her best mate back.<br>They settled back against the stone wall and this time when he offered her a hug she happily accepted it. It felt like cuddling with a Doctor-sized hot-water bottle and she sighed blissfully as her body slowly started warming up again.

"…this best friend you mentioned," he started out of the blue. "Was it a boy or a girl?"  
>"A girl," Donna glanced up at him. "Why?" Something strange lay in his gaze and she rolled her eyes with a silent giggle.<br>"You can be such a typical bloke at times!" Donna would never understand what men liked so much about snogging women.  
>"That's not it," he objected with the hint of red on his face. "I was just wondering why I don't know her, if she's your best friend and all that."<br>"That was at school, Doctor. We don't see each other anymore… somehow we just lost contact."  
>"She's not your best friend if you lose contact to her," he mumbled and finally Donna got what was troubling him.<p>

"We're different," Donna soothed him. "We won't just stop talking to each other because we found better people to spent time with."  
>"I can't think of anyone better," he said and, to Donna's surprised, leaned in to kiss her. It was another of these super short torture kisses, but when he pulled away Donna found him smiling. At least she'd managed to cheer him up.<p>

"I'm really getting the hang of this," he said proudly and held his face so close to hers that she felt his breath on her skin while he spoke.  
>"You're a natural," she wanted to said but half of the sentence was muffled by his lips on hers again. He held still for longer this time and then hesitantly nipped her bottom lip, drawing a whimper from her before releasing her again. This time he didn't wait for her to say anything, the look they shared was enough to clear things up.<br>He claimed her mouth again. She parted her lips for his tongue to find hers while her hand raised to his neck to find something to hold onto.

With the storm blazing outside, the Doctor and Donna had no need to worry about getting too cold. Neither of them let go before they were pretty much out of breath. Panting Donna snuggled herself close to him and the Doctor wrapped his arm around her, pulling her close. She could hear his twin hearts out-beating each other in his chest and smiled.  
>"I'm just glad we didn't cross a line," he said a little short of breath. Donna could almost hear the grin on his face and couldn't help but giggle.<p>

"No. What line? We're best friends and we, err, how did I put it?"  
>"Want to be 'close to each other'?"<br>"Exactly! There's nothing wrong with that."  
>"We can keep doing that?" the Doctor asked softly.<br>"Sure, as long as we do it as friends."  
>They exchanged a smile before Donna lay back and slowly let her eyes close. With him and his warmth she could safely fall asleep, he really was her best mate and as long as this wouldn't change there was no reason to struggle with complicated feelings.<p> 


	7. Part 2c

_A/N: The website wasn't too clear about the circumstances I needed, so I went on and made stuff up. If anybody's read the prose which mentions all this and discovers contradictions: sorry! Enjoy though ;)_

**Part 2.c: Hitting a weak point**

Donna was surprised how relaxed she felt. The bright sun gently woke her up after a short night, but she hadn't missed its warmth much, since the Doctor had taken good care of her body temperature.

She yawned amply. It was the second morning in a row that she woke up huddled against her Martian. Speaking of which, he seemed to have dozed off, too. She found him with closed eyes and a little frown on his face, sleeping. He almost looked as if he was struggling to remember something, his sleep didn't seem very comfortable.

"Hey, wake up," Donna gently shook the Doctor. He mumbled something Donna couldn't quite hear and opened his eyes just a crack. "Wow, you look terrible," she mumbled, eyeing up the dark circles around his eyes.

"Right and a good morning to you, too," he grumbled and sat up so Donna had to let go of him. Wincing, the Doctor stopped his move midway. "Ah, no, not moving that part of my back again," he moaned and remained in this semi-sitting position.

Donna grinned. "Are you stuck?"

"Very funny. I just need to be a bit more careful." Apparently trying to treat his back with care, the Doctor performed a complicated looking roll to his side and then somehow managed to push himself up onto his legs. All in all he resembled a very clumsy little tortoise. "Hah!" he proudly look down at Donna who was still sitting on the cave ground.

"That," she stated, "was pitiable," and then stood up matter-of-factly.

"My back hurts," he griped. "At least I didn't have a soft Time Lord to sleep on, everything I had was the stone wall."

"That's nothing to be ashamed of. We're all getting older," Donna mocked.

"I'm not old!" he pressed his hands in his back to check where exactly the pain came from. Judging by his expression, it came from everywhere.

"No, you are ancient," she pointed out.

"Not in Time Lord years!" he replied huffed. "For a Time Lord I'm young, really really young."

"Didn't you say this is your… 10th version?" Donna asked.

"Well it is, but they wear out quickly!"

"Sure they do, you're not really treating them with care, are you?"

"I am a traveller! I save whole galaxies! Of course I get hurt now and then," he remarked.

"I wasn't talking about the adventures. What I was talking about were all your little carelessnesses. Last week for example. You were fixing the TARDIS's circuits after showering. You were dripping wet! She almost barbecued you if not for her caution."

"What I was trying to say is that I'm not old," the Doctor reminded her and carefully avoided talking about this incident again. "If my back hurts then it's because I spent the night leaning against a cave wall."

Donna rolled her eyes and gave up with a shrug, smiling though. Her mood was far too good to argue with a grumpy Doctor about something like that. Instead she grabbed the bag with her towels and the sunscreen and, because she felt generous, even gave in to the Doctor's tormented look and carried his bag as well.

x-x-x-x-x-x

"I probably just pinched a nerve," the Doctor mused as they entered the TARDIS. Donna had lost her good mood somewhere on the way whilst the Doctor kept rambling about why his sore back and his headache were _no_ signs for his age but the uncomfortable sleeping position.

"If you think so," she mumbled and dropped the bags next to the control panel. At least they were back in the TARDIS. Donna felt a strange kind of relief because of this thought. The old girl really had become her home. "I need to get changed and take a shower before we go anywhere new," she announced. "How about you?"

"No, thanks. I'm in the med-bay if you need me. I think I bought a tool against trapped nerves a few centuries ago," the Doctor replied and vanished in the depth of the TARDIS. Donna sighed and entered the kitchen. To her mind, his little aches and pains were due to his ginger-beer-bender and the fact that he hadn't cured his hangover properly.

Well, she was to blame for the latter after all.

Donna put the kettle on and vanished into her room to get changed. She got out of her dress and the swim suit she hadn't been able to use and, together with the fluffy winter coat that had probably saved her life, put them in the clothes-basket. The memory of the last day was still clear in her mind, but she couldn't quite wrap her head around it.

What were they doing? They were friends and certainly the Doctor had no intention of changing that! At the same time it felt so right being close to her Martian in that way that Donna hardly cared about any downsides at the moment.

In the end it didn't matter. She didn't want to stew over details. Why shouldn't they enjoy themselves a little? As long a no-one got emotionally attached, they would be fine.

The kettle made itself heard and snapped Donna out of her brooding. Quickly she slipped a comfortable jersey dress on and scurried into the kitchen before the kettle could boil over.

The last thing she wanted was anything here to boil over and get things messy.

x-x-x-x-x

Some time later, when the Doctor still hadn't returned, Donna decided she could just as well go looking for him. He'd told her that he would be in the med-bay to fix his back, so when Donna pushed the white door open she expected a lot, but not to find the Doctor lying topless on a bed. He held a weird looking kind of stick in his hand that remotely resembled a fishing rod, only that, instead of a line, this thing ended in a thin metal stick with a small ball on top.

"What are you doing there?" Donna asked with a frown. She didn't trust medical instruments, especially those she'd never seen before and that were clearly alien.

"Sorry to make you wait," he replied. "I haven't used this in ages."

Donna's frown only deepened. "What could this space rod do about your pinched nerves?"

"See this orb at the tip of it?" he asked in full, albeit sore, teacher-mode. "I can control it from here and apply pressure to areas I usually couldn't reach, like my back."

Donna suspiciously eyed the metal ball up. Until now, it was only uselessly swinging back and forth on the thin metal arm. "…Well?" she asked expectantly.

"Err, the control seems to be a bit… reluctant today," the Doctor admitted and pressed a button on the remote without any visual result.

"Maybe the battery is flat?"

"It doesn't need batteries." He pressed a few other buttons; in vain.

"It's basically a massage-thing, right?" Donna asked. "Why don't we just stop by a spa? Have a day off and let an eight-armed masseuse fix you up. Oh, and don't mind me, I'm sure I could kill the time in an outer space luxury spa."

"I don't need any 'fixing-up'," he objected somewhat grumpily. "I am injured, not sore. What I need is medical treatment not a," he twisted his mouth dismissively "spa."

Donna rolled her eyes. "It's probably just a hangover and you're making such fuss about it."

"I had hangovers before," he snapped. "It never felt that horrible!"

"How many centuries ago was that, huh, sunshine? I keep telling you, we all grow older and start reacting more… sensitive to things we didn't mind years ago."

"I am not growing older," he growled and pressed another button on the remote. "I am… _maturing_, that's a difference!" Annoyed he tossed the gadget back into a big box next to the bed. The alien rod vanished inside it with a sullen _clonk_, and the Doctor crossed his arms and rested his chin upon them. Donna shook her head. Who'd thought that to such an ancient bloke "age" mattered so much.

Come to think of it, Donna knew he was 900-and-something but she had no idea what this was in human-years. 30? 40? Younger? Older? As far as she knew, blokes usually got queasy about their age when they came by their mid-thirties, but who knew if this held true for her Martian, too. "I still think your bender's to blame for your headache," Donna told him, but, in a fit of sympathy, she added: "of course a pinched nerve could add up to the pain and make it worse. Let me have a look at it."

Surprised by that, the Doctor raised his head. He watched her approach, with a careful curiosity in his look as if he expected she would pull his leg. "What are you doing?" he asked suspiciously.

"'Applying pressure to areas you can't reach'," Donna repeated.

"Right… okay," he kept his eyes on her until she was right behind him so he had no other option as to rest his head back on his arms.

"Just tell me where it hurts the most." Donna knew she couldn't replace a proper masseuse, but she had often helped her gramps when his back was sore after another day he spent crouched down on that hill.

"It's the upper back I reckon," he told her, facing the opposite wall. "Somewhere on the left side."

"Just tell me where to stop." Donna slowly trailed her middle and index finger up his spine and tried to get a feeling for his body. After all the things she'd learned about Time Lords, who knew how different their backs were? His skin felt cool, but Donna was sure the lower core temperature he'd mentioned was to blame. Or he was simply feeling cold, that would explain the shiver that followed her touch.

Then he suddenly winced. "Ouch! There it is."

"Oh, come on, I've hardly touched you, it can't have hurt that badly," she scolded and carefully started kneading his back.

"It hurt pretty badly!" he objected as Donna worked her way up his left shoulder.

"D-Donna, be careful there," he warned and she smiled about so much sensitivity.

"I won't break you, don't worry."

She had just found something that felt like a knot under his skin. Maybe he was right after all and he'd really pinched a nerve.

"No, seriously! There's a nerve cluster you better spa-" Before he could finish his warning Donna applied just a little bit of pressure on his back and his whole body went stiff under her touch. Then he collapsed on the bed.

Donna gasped and backed off, completely taken aback by this reaction. She had hardly done anything! He was clearly fooling her for not taking him seriously enough. "Haha, very funny, Spaceman," she remarked. "I got it now, I'm not gonna touch you there again, _stop that now_." The last part came out slightly squeakier than she'd intended it to.

"Spaceman?" she asked after a few moments of silence. She poked him at first and then softly shook his shoulder as if trying to wake him up. "Doctor? Doctor!?"

Panic chocked her as she reached for his wrist with trembling fingers. Donna felt the two pulses throbbing against her fingers in a steady rhythm and let out a relieved breathe. Thank God, he was alive, she hadn't killed him. Tears of relieve and at the same time fear sprang to her eyes. _What do I do now? What's wrong with him?_

A feeling as if someone was breathing down her neck made Donna jump up. It was the TARDIS, nudging at her mind.

"What should I do?" she asked the ceiling aloud even though it was probably unnecessary. The TARDIS could hear the Doctor's thoughts, Donna knew that much, but their communication was still quite unstable.

As a reply the ship around her hummed soothingly.

"So he's not dying, is he?! I can help him?"

No reply. Donna frowned.

"I… can't help?"

A low buzz that either meant "yes" or "sorry".

"But there has to be _something_ I can do! I- I don't even know what's happened! He just fainted and-" Donna fell quiet because her voice wasn't obeying her anyway; she just ended up sounding hysterical.

She tried to recall what he'd said to her. Something about a cluster, whatever that meant. She threw a worried glance at the unconscious Martian, half-heartedly thinking about going back to find out what she had touched there that had caused this reaction, but after what'd just happened… She didn't want to risk making it any worse.

Instead she went to search the boxes and shelves until she found a blanket, probably one for shocks or colds, and tucked him in it. At least that would keep him warm.

Then she curled herself up on a chair next to the bed and waited.

x-x-x-x-x-x-x

It was about three hours later, when somewhere in the Doctor's brain two synapses decided it was safe to resume their work, because the attack and therefore any possible danger was over. He had some very careful synapses. A stir went through his whole body and a frown flashed over his face. Only then his consciousness actually started returning to him. That was why, when his eyes fluttered open, his companion had already appeared at his side and gently stroked her hand over his head. This was not the worst thing to wake up to.

"-omise I'll listen to you from now on. I just thought you were making a fuss," was what he caught of her words, it was enough to make him smile. As if she would _ever_ listen to him.

"'s okay," he mumbled with a heavy tongue and blinked at the bright light of the med bay until he could see Donna properly. Slowly his senses started working again, just his muscles refused to move, yet.

"Are you okay, do you need anything?" Donna asked, crouching down so he could look at her face and not just her… well, it was nice to see her face, even though it was tensed up in worry.

"I'm alright," he said. "I just need a moment to boot up properly."

"'Boot up'? Sounds like you're starting a computer," she replied, keeping her voice soft. He knew he must look pitiful, otherwise she would have mocked him for that expression.

"There's not much difference. You could say you hit the emergency shut-down earlier."

He tried to sit up, but his body was still paralysed. Then he would just have to lie there and let Donna pet his head… He believed he would survive that. Out of the blue, Donna reached her hand out and wiped something from his jaw. "You're drooling," she told him, trying not to sound amused, but failed. The Doctor felt his face burning. Glorious. He hated when different parts of him woke up at a different pace.

"Sorry," he said, trying to sound as dignified as possible drool on his chin. Donna shook her head understandingly and got up to fetched a tissue for him. At least his mouth was working at all, so he returned to explaining all this to Donna, maybe he could talk the embarrassment away.

"You see, Time Lords have this cluster where most of our nerves intersect. It allows us to control pretty much everything that happens in our body, but it's vulnerable for pressure so it can disable us when hit in the wrong way."

Donna returned into his sight and shocked recognised that she was crying. And he was lying on this bed, unable to do much about it.

"I'm really sorry about it," she sniffled. "I didn't want to hurt you, I had no idea something like that could happen and then you fainted and-"

"Of course you didn't know it, how could you? Don't worry about it," he tried to soothe her. _Come on, body, wake up! She needs a hug. _At least a tickle in his arm told him he could reach out for her. Clumsily he took her hand and squeezed it gently. "See? I'm just fine, please don't worry."

Donna hiccoughed with a sob. How long had she been sitting there, worrying, he wondered. "Why are you not angry?" she wanted to know. "I nearly killed you and you keep soothing me." She sounded almost reproachful.

"You didn't kill me, not even nearly," he told her. "You made me take a nap. A- well, a surprise nap that I didn't want to take, but that's nap after all."

"Daft, Martian," Donna said but her expression brightened up a little. She leaned down to press a kiss to his mouth. The Doctor felt a heat flashing through his body that cast out what was still left of the paralysis. Too fast she stood up again and chuckling wiped the tissue over his lips. Right, he was drooling, he'd forgotten about that.

"That was nice and a tiny bit disgusting," she informed him grinning.

"Yup, that's my thing," he replied and wearily sat up on the bed.

"It's our thing," Donna corrected and the smile she passed him almost managed to knock the Doctor over again. What was it about her that made him feel like that?

"I'll wait outside until you're decently dressed and then I want to see you heading for bed," Donna said before the Doctor had gathered himself. "You need to sleep this off properly, do you hear me?"

He just nodded his head and waited until Donna had left the room then he dug his fingers into his hair. He was really a daft Martian after all. When had he started feeling like that for Donna?! And why now?! It would destroy everything they had, it was just this kind of feeling that made everything difficult.

Bugger! The Doctor threw a look over to the door. Just when everything had been working fine he had to fall in love with Donna. What was he supposed to do now? He couldn't keep on pretending just to be her friend and kiss her when he felt so much more… No! He had to stop that. No further kissing and touching until he had brought his feelings back under control. Angry with himself he got up from the bed. Donna was right, his carelessnesses would get him killed one day.


	8. Part 2d

**Part 2.d: Poison**

The next morning, the Doctor realised that Donna's massage had actually helped to cure his backache. Sure, it had also paralysed him for a few hours, but who was he to complain about that, as long as his back felt better? He should properly thank Donna, he decided and hopped out of his bed.  
>Yup, he was as good as new, except a minor headache that steadily buzzed through his skull.<br>It had appeared right after Donna had left him in the med bay; alone with the realisation that somehow he'd been silly or careless enough to fall for his companion.  
>This memory was enough to make the Time Lord want to crawl back under his sheets. Of course he couldn't. Donna would start worrying and come looking for him and the imagination of having his ginger companion here in his bedroom… Not that the mere presence of a bed could destroy centuries of clear constraints, but it was enough to give him all kinds of funny ideas. No. This was a risk he wasn't willing to take.<br>Waving his cheerful mood good-bye, the Doctor entered his bathroom.  
>Distraction was the keyword. He was good at distracting himself from serious emotional issues and eventually he'd just forget about it. He would simply bring them to a place where they would have to run a lot, if he was lucky something would even explode. It wasn't much of a plan, but it was everything he had.<p>

Prepared and decently dressed, he strolled down the corridors to the control room where Donna was already waiting. She was sitting on the jump seat, thumbing through a magazine. Today she had tied her ruby hair back in a side ponytail that softly rested on her right shoulder. It was exposing just enough of her pale neck to make the Doctor smile despite his gloomy mood. He was unable to keep his bad temper whenever Donna was around. How had he been able to put those feelings down to friendship? And how could he go back to making himself believe that? Because he really wished he could return to his earlier blindness.

"You're already up?" he finally got himself to enter the control room. It was rare that Donna was waiting for him to go somewhere instead of vice versa.  
>"Yes, since hours, you sleepyhead," Donna replied and closed the magazine. Then she turned around to look at him. "I wasn't sure if you would get up at all today."<br>"You told me to sleep it off properly, and who am I to disagree with my Donna?"  
>"<em>Your <em>Donna?" she asked cheekily.  
><em>Oh, bugger.<em>  
>"I, err-," he stuttered but Donna just shrugged it off with a grin.<br>"Meh, I suppose I am. Kind of. That makes you my Spaceman then, huh?"  
>"I think so," he agreed with a big smile.<br>_Pull yourself together! You're acting like a goopy teenager._

"A-anyway, where are we going today? A new planet? An ancient time? A spaceship? Oh, I feel spaceship-y today!"  
><em>Where everything will hopefully explode and I have no time to think about us.<em>  
>"Wherever you want," Donna giggled.<br>"_Molto bene_," he kicked the TARDIS alive with an exited grin and spun around, flicking lever and pushing buttons.  
>"Does that mean my massage-attempts haven't left any major damage?" she asked amused.<br>"Nope. I feel wonderful, all thanks to you, Miss Noble."  
>Donna shrugged his gratitude off, but the Doctor wouldn't let her get away that easily.<br>"I mean it. I feel great, and once this headache is gone, I'll be good as new."  
>"That doesn't sound like you've completely cured it!" Donna objected.<br>"It's nothing, I just need some fresh air," he said and regretted to have mentioned it in the first place.  
>"Right, because spaceships are so full of fresh air with their rusty air-cons," Donna pointed out, annoyed. "If you overexert, you'll relapse."<br>"I'll taken an ibuprofen if that makes you feel better," he offered, not ready to spend any more time in bed.  
>Donna let out a deep sigh.<br>"Make sure to get the time right, I'll get you some from the med bay. If there are any left, mind you! You've been eating them like smarties lately."  
>"Thank you," replied, ignoring the accusation in her voice and watched her vanish in the depths of the TARDIS. His brilliant companion. Always worried about him...<br>"Screw this, I need to tell her!"

x-x-x-x-x-x-x

Donna had just meant to mock the Doctor, but in the med bay she realised that he'd really used up all the pain pills. Sure, they'd been running low on them anyway, but it still confirmed her believe that the Doctor had better spent another day in bed.  
>Annoyed, Donna left the med bay again - maybe she had something else to cure his headache.<br>She wasn't entirely sure why she bothered anyway. Judging by the way he had been bouncing around the control panel like the big child he was, he didn't seem to be in much agony. Nevertheless… she knew she wouldn't be able to ignore it. If she didn't do anything about it, she would worry about him all day long and end up with a headache herself, and this annoyed her even more.

She tried to remind herself that the Doctor was older than her, that he was the one who had seen war and destruction and whatnot and that a little pounding in his head was hardly worth mentioning, but that only managed to make her sad. Donna didn't like to think about all those horrible things that had happened to him in the time before they met and before she had been be there to look after him. It was pathetic and pointless, since most of the things he'd been through would have been horrible anyway, with or without her around. She knew that, but it was still painful to think about it…

Oh hell. When had she fallen for her Spaceman? They had agreed on the just-mates-thing and Donna had hoped she would be able to keep it like that, but now… Angrily she shook her head as if she hoped those feelings would simply fall out of her mind like this. Whatever happened, she wouldn't allow those thoughts to alter their friendship. The last time she had felt like this, she had ended up in the web of a giant spider. Not that she believed the Doctor would go and kill her, but then again, blokes had the annoying habit of changing into homicidal jerks once Donna started dating them.  
>No. They were mates. Here and now. And here and now he had a headache. A complaint she could actually assuage.<br>She always had some painkillers in her purse in case of unexpected cramps. Those probably would help curing a headache, too, she reckoned.  
>"He better be grateful that I share my private stock with him," she mumbled and fetched the white box from her bag.<br>Aspirin was somewhat difficult to get out in space.

Donna returned into the control room with a big glass of water that was still fizzing with the aspirin.  
>"To your health," she said and handed him the glass. "Drink up."<br>"What would I do without you?" the Doctor asked smiling and brought the bubbling water to his lips.  
><em>"I never ever want to find out,"<em> Donna thought, but simply shrugged.  
>She wouldn't tell him about her inner struggle. Not wanting your best friend to die was a natural thing and nothing she would have felt silly about, but yesterday while he had been unconscious and she had been afraid she'd seriously harmed him? The way this fear had all but physically hurt her was nothing she wanted him to know about. She just wanted to make sure she'd never feel like that again…<p>

"By the way, you actually did use up all your ibuprofen," she informed him casually, just to try if her voice was still working.  
>The Doctor licked his lips and lowered the empty glass with a frown on his face.<br>"And what did I just drink?" he wondered bemused.  
>"My anti-cramp-medicine. You're welcome, by the way."<br>"Hmm… tastes funny," he mumbled and staggered backwards. The frown on his face was deepening while he tried to figure what was wrong with his body.  
>"Does it make you feel light-headed, too?" he asked and squinted his eyes as if looking ahead had suddenly become more difficult than he remembered it.<br>"Not really," Donna replied slowly. "It's no hard stuff, just aspirin."  
>The Doctor's face lost all colour and the glass slipped from his hand to shatter on the ground.<br>"What's wrong?!" Donna exclaimed and jumped away from the pieces of broken glass that flew around. Instead of an answer the Doctor made a gagging noise and pressed his hand in front of his mouth then he dashed past a completely shocked Donna.

She stood there, petrified, and tried to wrap her head around what had just happened. There it was again. This feeling of having missed something crucial, something that would tell her what was wrong with him. It was an ice-cold feeling that spread in her chest, squashing her lungs, and almost choking her.  
>Just like yesterday.<br>But this was different, Donna realised and spun around to where the Doctor had vanished. He wasn't unconscious so she could at least talk to him.

Shaking herself out of the paralysis, she ran after him. The room he'd vanished in was the kitchen.  
>"What is wrong?!" she repeated her question before she had fully entered the room. When she stepped inside she found the Doctor frantically searching the kitchen. Shelves and the fridge were wide open and grocery was spread on the floor in one big mess.<br>"It's just aspirin!" she tried to calm him, or maybe tried to remind herself that she couldn't possibly be to blame for his distress.  
>"Chocolate!" he chocked, ignoring Donna's objection. "Do we have any left?! I need chocolate!"<br>This seemed a bit much ado for a sudden craving, Donna thought. Actually it looked more like another detox-situation…  
>"N-no, just some couverture," she stuttered and pointed at the shelf next to the Doctor. He spun around, throwing flour and cake pans to the ground until he finally found the couverture bar and stuff it into his mouth in one piece.<p>

Once it was gone, the Doctor slid down on the shelves. Shaking wildly, he sat there, trying to chew and gag at the same time and, in between, he gasped for air. Donna gaped at the sight in front of her and managed to ask:  
>"W-what was that?"<br>The Doctor finally swallowed the big lump of chocolate down.  
>"That was me, trying not die," he replied very short of breath.<br>"Die? From aspirin?" Donna wondered, too flabbergasted by the whole situation to even realise what they meant while saying "die".  
>"Of course, die!" he snapped and she backed off, taken aback by how furious he sounded. "Aspirin's poisonous to me! It causes massive allergic, pulmonary and cerebral embolism and can even interfere with the hormone receptor intermediaries!"<br>Slowly the meaning of his words reached Donna and she realised the truth about the word "die". Not the kind of "die" they used ever day, not the playful kind for when things got a little bit risky, but the serious kind of "die" like in "gone forever" which she had refused to understand the first time. Together with this realisation another fact came tumbling down on her.  
>"I nearly killed you," she mumbled more to herself to try how those words sounded and if they would make more sense once they were out… they didn't, they still sounded ridiculous in this combination.<br>"Oh god, I had no idea…!"  
>"That's why I have none in the med-bay, you must have recognised that!" he retorted. "Are you sure you had no idea? Lately you're doing a good job at unknowingly nearly-killing me."<br>Donna clapped her hand in front of her mouth to hold back the sob that wanted to escape and shook her head. She wanted to tell him that she really had had no idea and how sorry she was, but instead of an answer she spun around and fled the kitchen… and his glare.

She was almost out of the TARDIS's door, when she remembered they were still somewhere in the vortex and she had no way to escape. Turning around, not knowing where to go or what to do, the fragments of the shattered glass caught her attention and she started picking them up, eager to do anything remotely useful.  
>With a trembling hand, she collected the pieces in her palm and tried to figure what on earth had just happened. Minutes ago she had been here to <em>help <em>him. She had loathed the idea of him suffering and then everything had gone askew and she'd almost killed him.  
><em>What if he hadn't been able to save himself?<em> She wondered and her view blurred with tears.  
>By now, she was able to fly the TARDIS home on her own. She wouldn't have died here. So why did she feel panic choking her?<br>She wouldn't have learned that it had been her fault he had died. So why did she feel so miserable?  
>It took her a while to realise that the mere idea of him gone, tore at her heart.<br>"Ouch!" a pain shot through her palm and Donna opened her hand that she'd unknowingly clenched to a fist around the bits of broken glass. God, she really was useless. Carefully she removed a fragment that had bored into her skin and sharply sucked in some air.

"Donna?" the Doctor asked from behind her and Donna froze in her move.  
>"There you are," his voice sounded soft. He wouldn't sound like that if he was about to chuck her out… what else could he want?<br>He walked around his companion to look at her face. He'd expected to find her crying, but not bleeding.  
>"What happened to your hand?!" he gasped and crouched down to her to have a look at her palm. She pulled her hand away from his touch with a sorrowful look.<br>"Don't," she whispered. The last thing she wanted was him to treat her injury after what she had done. The Doctor mistook her remorse for hurt feelings.  
>"I'm so sorry. I shouldn't have said those things," he said. "I didn't mean any of it, I was just- I was in shock and took it out on you, Donna."<br>"You were right," she replied.  
>"No I wasn't."<br>"You _were_," she insisted. "Maybe you didn't want to _say_ it, but that doesn't mean you were wrong. I almost killed you."  
>"But you didn't know," he objected with a little laugh, trying to show her how ridicules it was to believe she could have known it. Bitter about her own silliness, Donna avoided his look and returned to pick the broken glass up.<p>

"Donna," he pressed, helplessly watching his stubborn companion trying to tidy his mess up with her bleeding hand.  
>"Donna. <em>Donna<em>!" he carefully took her wrists to make her stop and listen to him.  
>"You didn't know. It was a misunderstanding. That happens between different species. I had to learn all your human weaknesses the hard way, too."<br>She looked at him without raising her head, but at least he had caught her attention.  
>"It was horrible!" he told her. "My first companion? I nearly-killed her umpteenth of times. Ever day! Humans are not bulletproof? Huh, you live and learn."<br>This managed to make Donna smile a tiny smile which the Doctor happily replied.  
>"You're lying to make me feel better," she mumbled.<br>"I'm just a bit… overdrawing it, but you get the picture. Did it work? To make you feel better I mean."  
>"…yeah," Donna reluctantly admitted and tried not to let this relieved smile of his affect her bad consciousness. Eventually she succumbed though and smiled back.<br>"And now I'm going to have a look at this nasty cut you've got there," he decided and slowly pulled her up to her feet with him. The cut on her hand throb unpleasantly and the blood, that steadily dripped down from her wrist, had started to form a little puddle on the ground.  
>Maybe just her nerves were to blame, or the relief that none of them was seriously hurt after everything that had happened, but suddenly Donna felt dizzy. She could feel the pressure on her ears and the world around her blurred. The last thing she saw was the Doctor mouthing a word that could have been "Donna" then darkness swallowed her whole and her legs gave in.<p>

x-x-x-x-x-x-x

For how long had she been unconscious? It could hardly have been more than some minutes, Donna reckoned, because when she opened her eyes again, she was still in the TARDIS's control room, just that now she was facing the ceiling.  
>Moaning she tried to sit up but quickly two arms held her back. She looked around, saw that those arms belong to the Doctor and relaxed. He held her in a semi-lying position while her legs were propped up on some kind of box.<br>Donna frowned.  
>"You've scared me, I didn't expect you to pass out like that," he told her and she could hear the fear still resonating in his voice. "You've had a shock, so don't get up just yet. The blood needs some time to return to your brain properly."<br>Oh, that explained what the box was for.  
>"Okay" Donna quietly said and tried her best not to look at him. Sheepishly she glanced down at her hand to check on her injury.<br>"Did you use your tie to dress my cut?" she asked amused and blinked to make sure her eyes weren't just playing a trick on her. No, there really was a blue tie tightly wrapped around her hand. Her blood had already started seeping through the silken fabric and left a nasty, dark spot on it.

"You were bleeding badly and it was everything I had at hand," the Doctor quickly justified as if he expected Donna to be mad at him for that.  
>She turned her head so she could look at him without sitting up or having him release her out of this embrace. Judging by the red stains on his shirt and jacket, he had caught her before she had hit the floor and then treated her wound.<br>"It's just a little cut, I wouldn't have bled to death, if you had fetched a bandage from the med bay," she told him softly, not wanting to argue with him after he'd taken such effort. "I'm afraid those stains won't come out again though."  
>He shrugged.<br>"I guess I've been panicking a bit," he admitted and carefully raised her hand to check on the makeshift bandage.  
>"Because of a shock and a tiny cut?" Donna wondered and watched him gently moving his fingers over her hand. He acted with care and tenderness and for a second Donna wished she would have been awake while he had treated her hand.<br>"Because of you," he corrected. "You keep distracting me." He raised her hand to his lips to place a soft kiss on the bandage. She realised that she was staring at him and quickly closed her mouth.  
>"That's not exactly a friend-kiss," she told him and sat up and tried to ignore that her head started swimming again. A part of herself was cursing her for rejecting him, but she couldn't stand looking at him like this any long. This one kiss on her hand had expressed so much love - more than any of the others - despite its innocents.<p>

"I know it's not. This is something I wanted to talk to you about…" the Doctor replied and there was a certainty to his look that soothed and scared Donna at the same time.  
>"No, Spaceman, listen: it's been a weird day. Both of us thought we'd lose each other at some point, and that makes people think funny things." She struggled to pull herself up, propping herself up on the control panel and prayed her legs wouldn't give in.<br>"You're scared I don't mean it," he said without bothering to stand up.  
>"Of course you don't!" she shouted. "You've said so yourself: Just. Mates." She put great emphasis on the last two words.<br>"But I changed my mind!" he replied firmly. "I do that all the time, I change my mind."  
><em>"How do I know you're not changing it again!?"<em>  
>Bugger! Now she had started crying. Angry with herself, Donna wiped her hand over her eyes. Of course she had recognised how he was looking at her lately, and she had put it down to a brief crush. It wasn't fair that he made it sound like something serious and enduring while she knew better than that.<br>"Because you're right, you keep changing," she continued. "When I came with you, you were just a… bloke in a box, and then you suddenly decided to show me how different you are with your two hearts and core temperature and whatnots! What else are you going to change? Bloke to alien. Mate to more. Nice to 'Let's feet her to a giant spider!'?"  
>Donna realised too late that she had said the last part out loud.<br>"Never mind," she added silently.  
>"Donna, you don't really expect me to do that?" he asked shocked and slowly got to his feet to look her in the eyes.<br>"I already proved that I suck at assessing men's characters," she replied, icier than she'd wanted to. "Do you think I was with Lance because I expected something like this to happen? Do you think I wanted to marry him because of that? I loved and I trusted him and he turned out to be this… jerk. Now I love and trust you and that's scary. No, you're nothing like him, but who tells me you don't… _change _again?

They stood there for a while in silence before the Doctor spoke up: "You love me?" he asked quietly.  
>Despite herself, Donna blushed.<br>"Shut up," she sniffed, annoyed that this had slipped her, too. Could she never hold her tongue?  
>"And don't tell me you love me, too!" she quickly added, shooting him a warning glare. "Because I've heard all that before and I just don't believe it anymore."<br>"Okay," he agreed slowly. "And if you don't want to, we won't change anything. I won't change and I won't say anything."  
>"Good!"<br>"I will show you though."  
>Donna blinked in confusion.<br>"Show me what?"  
>"That I do… what you don't want me to say. We can be just mates if you like, but that won't stop me from showing you what I really think when I look at you."<br>"You don't have to do anything for me," she told him seriously.  
>"It's not like I could help it," he chuckled. "Keeping you warm. Treating your cuts - even if it ruins my best ties. This was a very good one, by the way. I'm going to miss it."<br>She smiled.  
>"Aha! Saying silly things to make you smile. I will just keep doing all this and not change anything at all."<br>Donna realised that he was right. He had been doing all this for her since forever and she had probably done a lot for him, too. Nothing would change if they went on like this, except for what he had said… or not said to her, which seemed to change everything.  
>"…I'm confused," she admitted very slowly. "And my hand hurts, because some dunce has bandaged it with a tie. Can you have a look at it?"<br>The Doctor smiled warmly and drew her into a hug.  
>"Of course, and do you know why?"<br>"Tell me."  
>"I can't. I promise I wouldn't." He grinned, pleased with himself, and Donna swat at his arm.<br>"I hate you!" she grumbled and then pressed a brief kiss to his lips before she took his hand with her unharmed one.  
>"And I love you… funnily enough. Must be the blood-loss, so you better get me to the med-bay."<br>He positively beamed at her.  
>"Med-bay!" he repeated enthusiastically. "Allons-y!"<p>

-The End-


End file.
